


When You Can't Go Home Again

by lennydotdotdot



Series: Broken Halla Horns [2]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Child Inquisitor, Fantastic Racism, Filler, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Mistakes were made, Mourning, PTSD, Regret, Revenge, Teen Inquisitor, Teen!inquisitor, Travel, ancient elves don't know how groceries work, buddy cop, not sure who's babysitting who in this situation but alright, oh boy, palate cleanser for other angsty fic, teenquisitor, there's both here, young inquisitor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-04
Updated: 2019-06-13
Packaged: 2020-04-07 13:58:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 27,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19086460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lennydotdotdot/pseuds/lennydotdotdot
Summary: The Inquisitor takes off alone to seek justice for his fallen clan, and finds himself bringing an unlikely traveling companion.





	1. Mission

Falon took off in the dead of night with little more than his usual traveling pack and his Hart. He left a hastily-scrawled note on Josephine’s desk that read, "Josephine, I'm leaving and will return once I've sorted a few things. -F.L." There was absolutely no chance that she wouldn't know where he was going. By now, everyone knew. He’d promised them over and over that he would, no matter how many times they rolled their eyes or promised it was a useless proposition.

With Corypheus finally defeated, he had one thing left to do, something he should have taken leave from the Inquisition to see to long ago.

He rode his Hart through the mountains in the night and finally broke his pace somewhere in the Emerald Graves in the night, because he knew better than to run his Hart to exhaustion no matter how antsy he might be himself.

He’d taken Hauwen, his favorite mount in all of the Skyhold stables – coincidentally, the one that had once bitten Solas in the back of the head. The golden Hart would have gladly raced through the day and the night if Falon hadn’t stopped him. He was reliable as anything, strong, and wild. And Falon didn’t have to keep pace with Bull on his much slower draft horse, or Sera on her Dalish pony. He let Hauwen run the way he was meant to run – as fast as he damn well pleased.

It was almost like flying when Hauwen hit an open plain with nothing to interrupt his gait. But eventually he started to slow, and Falon knew it was time to water his mount and rest his legs after a full day of riding. He’d gotten used to the sensation of riding long ago.

Falon took some time to set up a small camp. He knew he wouldn’t sleep, but he could find something to busy his hands at least while Hauwen grazed and rested. They were passing through the Dirth by this point, a more forested part that was green, yellowing for the fall.

He’d found a nice spot over a stream where he could fish and Hauwen could drink, and started a small fire so he could get to work roasting some dinner for himself. He had rations, but the more forage he could find the better. He stopped when he heard Hauwen bray loudly, and dropped his line and smothered his fire before rushing into the bushes.

Four men approached, four men in Orlesian armor. Falon ran to Hauwen’s side and placed a hand on his shoulder, hushing, “Easy, easy.”

The men pointed their spears on Falon and his mount, and Falon became acutely aware that without his entourage he was not the Inquisitor. He was a lone Dalish elf. And a lone Dalish elf was easy prey.

The men talked to each other in Orlesian, and Falon let one hand trail to the shortsword on his hip while the other rested on Hauwen’s shoulder. The stag’s shoulder was stiff as ironbark and Falon could tell why.

The men had no idea he spoke Orlesian.

“ _It’s a Dalish savage_ ,” the one furthest on the right said.

“ _Think there’s a pack of them?”_ the one on the left said. Yellow plume on his helmet. “ _They make good sport.”_

“ _With that mount? I thought they rode little deer.”_

_“More venison, I guess.”_

Falon scowled and snapped in his (admittedly atrocious) Orlesian: “ _No one eats my Hart.”_

The men paused. Falon knew exactly what they were thinking. No Dalish savage should speak the Empire’s tongue. Now that he had their attention, he took his hand off his blade and held his hand out for them to see, flaring the mark to give them an inkling of who he was. The men scurried back like roaches from the light, and Falon placed his hand on his hip.

“Falon of Clan Lavellan,” he introduced himself. “And of the Inquisition.”

The men exchanged glances, and finally the one with the yellow plume stepped forward and said, “Apologies, my lord. Where are your companions, if I may ask?”

Hauwen brayed and stamped his feet and Falon felt a chill down his spine. He patted the hart’s shoulder to calm him and said, “I take it from your comments you’ve murdered my people before. Forgive me for saying I don’t trust you.”

The man laughed.

The other men tensed. Hauwen scraped the ground and lowered his head.

“You could just be some apostate for all we know,” the man said. “Everyone knows the Inquisitor travels with his bodyguards. I would wager you’re some wild elf profiting on good soldier’s ignorance.”

Falon took his hand off Hauwen’s shoulder and placed it on the blade on his hip. “Would you stake your men’s life on that?”

The man drew his sword.

“I won’t have to.”

“Falon’din enasal,” Falon muttered coldly.

The moment the man moved to attack Falon, Hauwen swept against him with his horns and knocked him off balance. Falon surged forward, grabbing the man’s sword arm under his elbow and digging his knife in the weak point of the Chevalier’s armor, under his arm. His knife dug in just between two ribs, but he stopped short of actually killing the man when he dropped his blade.

“Got a reason for me to let you go?” Falon hissed.

The Chevalier wheezed, “Inquisitor! Apologies! I mistook you there.”

“You were talking about hunting my people,” Falon replied. “They make good sport, you said.”

“Just a…just a joke, my lord!”

Falon withdrew, and the man crumpled on the floor. Falon remained the only thing standing between the chevalier and a face full of Hart hoof, but at least for the moment he felt safe enough to sheathe his weapon.

“I want your names, and the name of your commanding officer,” Falon said.

He heard a click. When he looked up, all three of the other soldiers had turned crossbows on him. The Chevalier he’d disarmed stumbled to a stand and he glared at them.

“Or,” the chevalier said, “We take that beast of yours and you traipse on back into the woods where you came from.”

Falon’s left hand ached for him to open a small rift and tear these four to shreds. But before he could move, a wave of ice swept across the field and froze the three soldiers in place. Falon didn’t know who cast that spell, but he didn’t stop and wait to find out. He kicked up the sword the Chevalier had dropped and took it up himself, slashing at the joint in the man’s knees and slicing apart the leather underneath. Then for good measure he kept pressing, pushing the man back until his back hit a tree, at which point he drew his own knife and said, “I hate to waste a prayer on a murderer.”

And he slit the man’s throat.

When he turned around, he saw a tall elf in simple garb hooded and immediately thought, “Solas?”

The man drew back his hood, revealing green vallaslin and graying hair tied into a knot at the top of his skull. “I am Abelas.”

Falon hadn’t honestly expected to see Abelas again, but he nodded. “Andaran atishan.”

The greeting was not returned.

“Why did you not kill that man in the first place?”

Falon sheathed his dagger and glanced at the three frozen bodies. “I don’t know. I didn’t think they’d be stupid enough to keep trying after that.”

Abelas tilted his head and glanced between Falon and the Hart. Hauwen clopped up towards him, and Falon felt compared to warn him, “Careful, he bites—” but for once the Hart was simply curious. He gave Abelas a long sniff before wandering off to graze on what non-bloodied grass remained, and Falon was left scratching his head.

“I, uh, caught some fish,” Falon said. “I’ll have to get moving in the morning, but you’re welcome to it once it’s finished cooking.”

“I have a cabin downstream,” Abelas replied.

It was such a weird thing to think, that Abelas had found himself a cabin and settled in. It was hard to imagine him in a domestic setting like that. Falon cocked his head.

“Are you inviting me?”

“If you wish.”

“I’ll bring the fish, then."

 


	2. Butter

Falon rode Hauwen at a walk while Abelas led him towards the cabin. Falon was a little disappointed to realize that the cabin Abelas had meant was not the domestic, cozy setting he’d imagined but instead overgrown and very clearly abandoned. Abelas had made it his home nonetheless, stripping away some of the plant growth from the door and windows and keeping at least a few lanterns lit.

Falon figured it might at least have some space to cook, and dismounted without further judgement. After all, he’d spent most of his life on the road, and he’d never had a real stove to himself before and he could make do without one now.

They wordlessly entered the cabin and Abelas extended a hand to light a few candles around the room. Falon set his basket of fish on the only table in the room. The inside of the cabin had nothing to constitute a bed, just a stove, a firepit, and a small table with no chairs. He wondered if perhaps those things had been present, but too damaged to use.

“It is…not much.”

“I can work with this,” Falon replied, unconcerned. “Thanks for the assist back there.”

Abelas regarded Falon for a long moment before asking, “Do you not travel with others?”

Falon said, “Usually. But not this time. There was something I needed to do on my own.”

Abelas took a seat on the floor, and Falon began cleaning the fish before cutting them into steaks and salting them lightly. After the salt, he added a bit of thyme from his satchel. Abelas seemed not to have much in the way of food, so Falon suspected this would be the entirety of their meal.

“What is it you intended to do?”

“Well,” Falon muttered, “before all this happened, I would have returned to my clan. Can you light this?”

Abelas extended a hand and lit the stove, and Falon let the pan sit on top to heat. He took a seat on the floor across from Abelas while he waited.

“What is stopping you?” Abelas asked.

Falon had already pulled one of the leather notebooks he’d gotten from Varric and begun to idly fold and crease a page towards the back. He couldn’t make himself look up to answer. “They’re dead.”

“Ah.”

A long pause hung in the air, and for a moment Falon figured that would be the end of it. And then Abelas said, softly, but none too gently, “What happened?”

“A duke murdered them,” Falon replied, keeping his voice as even as he could manage. “Not… personally. He sent mercenaries.”

There was a long silence between them, but eventually Abelas asked, “Can your companions not assist you?”

Falon laughed breathlessly and found himself fidgeting with his little braid. He didn’t have enough hair yet for a long, impressive braid like his father used to have. In fact, Falon’s hair had been much longer when he was young, but when he chose his Vallas’lin he had to shave most of it away to make room for the new markings.

Abelas stared, unmoving, and Falon realized he hadn’t answered.

“Oh, I just don’t think they’d approve.”

Abelas didn’t pry further. Instead he indicated the stove with a glance. Falon stood up and got the fish down on the pan and kept an ear out as he trimmed the stems from some fresh elfroot. He flipped each of the steaks and tossed the elfroot in to fry in the fishfat. After wilting it, he glanced around for a plate, anything to serve it on, and found a few intact ceramic plates hidden away in the cover. He wiped them on his shirt before lifting the fish and some elfroot onto them with his knife, and handed one plate to Abelas. Then he served himself and took a seat on the floor.

Before his butt hit the ground, Abelas took a small bite of fish and said, “Thank you. It’s very good.”

“Oh. Sure,” Falon said. He ate his portion mostly in silence, and was a little pleased to see that Abelas cleared his plate. Falon guessed he really did like the food. That, or he hadn’t had an actual meal since he left the temple. Both seemed equally likely.

Abelas broke the silence by asking, “This duke. Where is he?”

“Wycome,” Falon said. “Other side of the Waking Sea. It’ll take longer than catching a boat, but I’m riding through Orlais. I don’t want anyone to stop me.”

Abelas nodded, and looked over Falon. “Perhaps I could join you.”

Falon had to think about that.

It’d be useful to travel with a mage, but he didn’t know Abelas. He didn’t know why he wanted to come, or if he would even approve of anything Falon intended to do. He’d made it rather clear that he had no interest in Falon before, and it seemed strange. Falon cocked his head and asked, “Why would you want to do that?”

Abelas glanced throughout the cabin and coughed softly. “I…am unused to this world. A guide would be helpful.”

Falon laughed.

He didn’t mean to, but it just came out. He wondered if Abelas even had met any other people since leaving the temple, if he’d even figured out how to cook for himself without an obvious source of food. It rather came in handy to know what plants were edible and which would leave you expelling your own guts, and which parts of which plants gave which outcome when prepared which way.

“You can come if you like. But we’ll need to find you a ride.”

They finished eating, and Falon spent the night sleeping on the floor of Abelas's cabin. Again, Falon had to walk Hauwen so Abelas could keep up.

Abelas did not ask many questions, which served Falon well when he didn’t really feel like talking. He supposed the downside of a travelling companion who didn’t much care for the Dalish was that he felt suddenly very self-conscious about the songs he sang. He settled for singing in Orlesian, since Abelas didn’t speak the language and couldn’t comment on the songs he didn’t agree with without first asking what they meant.

Shockingly, he seemed to recognize the _tune_ to Aloamin, and his ears pricked as Falon sang.

“That’s an Elvhen song,” he said when Falon finished.

Falon nodded, and admitted, “I figured the tune would have changed, at least.”

Abelas raised a brow. “It’s rarely unaccompanied, so that is…new.”

“Well, I know lots of Dalish songs you probably don’t know, but I gather you don’t want to hear them.”

Abelas apparently felt no need to contradict this, and Falon huffed irately. Maybe later, he’d have a bout of only singing Dalish traveling songs, just to be petty, _he shouldn't have to be ashamed of his culture like this,_ but they were just no fun without a disorganized choir of dozens of elves all singing off key and Ashami banging on her drums.

When Falon _did_ feel like talking, he wasn’t sure how much he could get away with asking Abelas. The questions Abelas _did_ ask were occasionally things Falon couldn’t really answer. When Abelas asked why the elves surrendered the Dales, Falon replied, “They were outnumbered. The chantry had waves of men at their disposal. Our clans are descendants of the knights and nobles who refused to surrender.”

“But why did they not continue the fight?”

“Well they did. Those who kept to the Dales were either killed or subjugated, so they retreated, and became the clans we know now.”

“Is retreat any better, given how things have changed?”

Falon glanced at the man from atop Hauwen.

“I don’t know,” Falon said. “That’s just what I was taught. I’d direct you to the person who told me the story, if they weren’t dead.”

Abelas found no humor in the statement, which left it hanging in the air bitterly.

When they came across a stable with an elven stable hand, Falon felt instant relief. At least the owner wouldn't be too prejudiced to even speak to them, if he had an elf in his employ. Falon dismounted, still clutching the wallets of the chevalier’s he’d killed (they wouldn’t be needing that coin anymore) and some money he’d thought to pack ahead. Not really enough for a mount of Hauwen’s caliber. But then, if he was being honest, he wasn't sure Abelas could handle a mount like that anyway. Falon had more money, tucked close to his heart, but it wasn’t for spending. He wouldn’t spend a silver of it.

“By Andraste! You’re Dalish!”

Abelas coughed, loudly.

“You don’t have any horses you’d be looking to get rid of, do you?”

The stablehand looked between them, clutching his hoe tightly. “Well, y’see I’m not, uh, I’m not in charge. You’ll have to talk to Jaques for that. I don’t know if he’ll sell to elves though.”

“Why not?” Falon asked. “A sovereign’s a sovereign in anyone’s hand.”

The elf shrugged. “That’s just how it is, ser, I'm not saying I don't agree with you. Let me get him for you.”

When the stablehand skittered off, Abelas turned to Falon with a raised brow. “Is that typical?”

“What, the Dalish thing or the elves thing?”

“Both.”

“Dalish clans try to stay away from cities,” Falon said. “Otherwise, the local chantries send templars after our mages. And for the elves that live with humans, well, I don’t know. I’d only met humans a handful of times before, well, this happened.”

Falon raised up the anchor and let it crackle, shedding a faint green light across Abelas’s stoic face.

“And did you not discuss this with them?”

Falon laughed. “I was eight, twelve, and fourteen, and the first time the human was my age, the second time the human had come out to the woods to hang herself, and the third time it was a pair of soldiers and they tried to kill me.” And, he thought bitterly, they did kill his brother.

“Fourteen? When was this?”

“I’m seventeen now,” Falon replied. “So about three years ago.”

Abelas looked nothing less than flabbergasted, his mouth agape and his brows furrowed incredulously. “You are a child.”

Falon scowled. “I am _not_.”

Abelas looked decidedly unconvinced, but their conversation was cut short by the stablehand returning with an old, fat human with a bushy blue-grey beard and a receding hairline. The man grinned from ear to ear when he saw them, and Falon took a moment to realize he was grinning not at them, but at Hauwen.

“He bites,” Falon warned as he dismounted.

“Beautiful animal though. When Darol told me you brought a Hart with you, I had to come see. Look at him," Jaques said, approaching carefully. Hauwen huffed, and tossed his head, the mildest warning he was going to give. Fortunately, Jaques stopped approaching and settled for crooning from a distance. "Oh, aren't you a gorgeous creature.”

Falon smiled. “He’s good company on the road. That said, my companion and I were looking to buy another mount who can keep pace with mine.”

“Oh. Not selling?”

Falon’s knuckles went white as he clenched Hauwen’s reigns. “Definitely not.”

“I could trade you two good horses for him, if you change your mind. Otherwise, might be pricey for you.”

Abelas glanced at Falon. It was his money, after all, and his decision what to do. But Falon shook his head. “Course not. He’s with me, and he’s not for sale. I’ll be riding him til one of us kicks it.”

The stablemaster sighed, and looked over the Hart one more time. “Alright. One condition though. Show me how he rides.”

Falon sighed with relief. “Now _that_ I can do.”

\--

The course the stablemaster had set up was short, but had a few jumps and twists that a poor mount wouldn’t manage easily. Hauwen, however, could handle that and more. Falon weaved through poles and jumped gates and handled the turns easily, using his weight to guide Hauwen the way he wanted to go rather than yanking on the reigns like a shem.

The stablemaster had stars in his eyes when Falon finally dismounted, and said, “What I wouldn’t give for a beast like that. You sure you’re not selling?”

“I’m sure,” Falon replied shortly.

Abelas had taken to leaning against the fence while Falon showed off Hauwen’s speed and agility, but he pushed himself off and turned to the stablemaster. “May we see your horses now?”

“Well hold on,” Jaques said. “How are you at riding?”

Falon glanced at Abelas curiously.

Abelas glanced up at Hauwen and said, “I…have not ridden in a very long time.”

Probably a couple thousand years.

“Well why don’t you show me with his?”

Falon’s first impulse was to say no, because Hauwen threw most who tried to ride him. In fact, Falon had gotten him for a damned bargain because he was so unruly for his previous owner. But Hauwen liked Abelas. Maybe enough to ride well for him.

“Why is this necessary?”

“So I don’t pair you with a horse you can’t handle. I don’t know much about you Dalish, but I haven’t seen many elves who really know how to ride.”

Abelas glanced between Falon and Hauwen, and sighed. “Alright.”

Falon handed Abelas the reigns and said, quietly as he could, “Don’t tug him. He’ll throw you if he doesn’t like how you’re handling him. Just lean the way you want him to go and give him a squeeze to speed him up. Lean back to get him to slow and forward to speed him up. But he likes you, so you’ll be fine.”

Abelas mounted Hauwen with little difficulty, but the Hart’s response to the larger, unfamiliar elf mounting him was to snort and huff and swing his head back irately, and graze Abelas with his antlers. Falon gave him a firm pat on the neck, and muttered softly to him in elvhen, “ _Peace, my friend._ ”

Abelas grunted, and steered Hauwen off towards the track.

Hauwen moved for Abelas, but not like he did for Falon. On tight turns, Hauwen let his side brush right up against the fence. On jumps, he gave a wild buck midair and spun quickly when he landed. Abelas held on, but by the time he reached the end of the track he was worse for wear, clearly exhausted. Falon was just glad he hadn’t gotten punted into the mud and stomped on. That had reportedly been the fate of Hauwen’s previous rider, and part of why his owner was so keen on getting rid of him.

“That was…”

“He doesn’t ride easy for most,” Falon said. “He’s a mind of his own, and he does what he wishes.”

“Well, I have a horse in mind for your friend here. Darol, go get Buerre for me.”


	3. Sorry

Buerre, as it turned out, was a spotted horse with a pink nose and a long yellow mane, built for draft but quick enough to keep pace with Hauwen’s relaxed gait. And, more importantly, he was tame enough to tolerate Abelas.

Buerre cost fifteen sovereigns, and his tack another eight, all of which Falon paid wordlessly. He’d expected to be charged at least double, just on account of some of the outlandish rumors he’d heard regarding the Dalish. He’d realized very quickly that without his entourage people were not quite as hospitable towards him, and was relieved not to be overcharged.

Buerre was a good enough horse, perfect for Abelas, who hadn’t ridden in literally hundreds of years. He was the type of horse Sera and Varric would have picked out – a horse who would follow the trail with barely any need for direction from his rider.

They rode quite a while before Falon informed Abelas that the horse would need rest, and they found a dry spot to camp just up a slope from a creek.

Falon nibbled on a bit of jerky he’d brought for the trip, and saw Abelas watching him.

“You want some?” he asked, digging through his pack for another satchel filled with jerky, be it beef, venison, mutton, or fruit. “I’ve got plenty.”

Abelas shook his head. “This…clan you come from. What was it like?”

“What do you mean, what was it like?”

Abelas tried in elvhen but Falon could only understand a few words, and they made no sense to him. Abelas furrowed his brow in frustration as he searched for the words. Eventually he settled on, “What do you think of when reminded of it?”

Falon had to stop and think about that. Mostly, he thought, the fact that he would never see any of them again. But that thought died on his tongue, when instead he held out a hand as if reaching for the right thing to say and found himself pointing at the fire.

“A big fire, and all of us gathered around while the First played his drum and Deshanna sang. Tending a sick halla, or stringing a bow for a younger hunter who hadn’t learned how yet. Gathering flowers and herbs and checking snares with the hunters. It’s nowhere, but it’s everywhere.”

Now he felt Cole’s influence on him, and he was sure as he spoke that he was echoing the thoughts Cole had spoken aloud to the rest of the Inquisition at some point or another.

“Sorry. That doesn’t make any sense.”

“What of the shemlen?”

“Easy. Dogs and crossbows.”

Abelas left it at that. Falon took the first watch, a fine excuse to take his sleeping draught in private. He hadn’t packed enough, he realized, and at their current pace he was sure he would run out. He might be able to get away with half a dose…

\---

Falon asked few questions about Elvhenan, and Abelas asked little about Clan Lavellan. Mostly, their travels were silent save for idle humming from Falon and the beat of hooves against the trail. Eventually, Abelas settled on asking about Falon’s travelling companions, and the Inquisition, and Falon was more than happy to tell about Dorian and Sera and Vivienne, about the Iron Bull and Blackwall and Cassandra, and even Cole here and there.

“This…Red Jenny. What is it?”

“Sera’s bad at explaining,” Falon muttered as he prodded at the campfire with a long stick. “But it’s a sort of network of people, of common folk, and they heckle the nobility when a point needs making. Or sometimes just for fun. I don’t know. That’s just how she said it.”

Abelas used an elvhen word Falon didn’t understand, and quickly rephrased his statement in common.

“Is Sera the she-elf with you?”

“Oh. Yes,” Falon said. “The blonde one.”

Abelas paused to consider. “She seemed…”

“Pissed off?”

“No—” Abelas paused, his face hard and stern, no different than usual. “Yes.”

“When we entered your temple, we had a disagreement. We had soldiers outside, fighting, and we were pursuing the Venatori. Well, the Venatori had blown a hole in the ground. Sera and Blackwall—the bearded man with me—wanted to follow through it. I told them no.”

Abelas nodded.

“Both of them were mad at me,” Falon muttered. “Sera more than Blackwall.”

Abelas raised his chin. “You had two others with you.”

“Oh. Morrigan and Solas.”

“Did they agree?”

Falon laughed.

“Morrigan did, but Solas _hates_ me,” he said. “I’m sure no matter what I did he’d have found something to be mad about.”

“Why do you say that?”

Falon traced the vallaslin under his right eye with his thumb, and said, “He doesn’t like the Dalish.”

Abelas grunted an acknowledgement, and took a sip from his waterskin.

“That, and he said some things I didn’t much like,” Falon muttered. “And I shouldn’t have, but I punched him. So, I’m sure that didn’t help.”

Abelas raised a brow, and his vallaslin twisted as he did. “What did he say, exactly?”

“Called me a savage,” Falon said, even though he knew it wasn’t exactly right. “Called all of us, my clan, my people, savages. Said he was glad to know he was right about us. I _know_ I shouldn’t have. But I did. So, if he didn’t like me before, he _hated_ me after.”

Falon watched Abelas’s ears, looking for a quirk, a dip, anything, but they were relaxed and immobile and his face was hard and unchanging as a stone carving. Maybe Abelas agreed with Solas, maybe he still agreed. Falon knew that hitting Solas had vindicated him.

There were at least a few times after that incident when Solas had been a little gentler towards him, or a little more concerned. He’d never drudged up the past when Falon was injured or in pain, and he’d been distressed by Falon’s lack of care for his own wellbeing. At least on some level, Falon thought they might have been coming to an understanding, until Solas left without so much as a goodbye.

“You did not lash out when I said…something similar.”

Falon cracked a smile. “What, while you were all the way on that pulpit? I’m not nearly tall enough for that.”

Abelas didn’t laugh, and Falon sighed. No sense of humor, he swore.

“I didn’t know you as well, and by then I’d had some time to mourn, and think things out,” Falon said. “When I hit Solas, it’d only been a couple of days.”

Abelas nodded, his expression as stern as before. Falon was tempted to return to Sera, since at least when it came to her he could offer tales of mischief and pranks and climbing up onto the roofs late at night to make impossible shots and terrorize Commander Cullen.

It surprised him when Abelas said, “ _Ir abelas.”_

There was an excellent pun in there – _I know you are but what am I_ – but Falon was too stunned to make it. “For what?”

Abelas’s head tilted by a hair. “For your clan. It could not have been easy.”

Abelas was echoing the words _Falon_ had offered when he spoke to Abelas, beside the Vir’abelasan. “I guess we’re both orphans, now.”

\---

Eventually, Falon let slip that he had a twin and Abelas found this interesting enough to inquire about. Perhaps he already knew that Athim was dead, but unlike the rest of his clan his death was more personal to Falon, the one that clung to his mind and haunted his nightmares. Unlike the rest of the clan, Falon had watched his brother die, had cradled him in his arms while his killers dragged him and his corpse into the back of a cart. But Falon didn’t say this, and Abelas said nothing that would require such a lengthy explanation.

“You speak of your clan more than your brother,” Abelas noted.

“I guess I’ve got a habit of taking him for granted,” Falon said quietly. When he was younger, that was true. He took for granted that his brother was always going to be around, and never realized until after his death how alone he was without him. He’d entered the world with Athim close in tow, and now he’d have to leave it on his own.

Abelas did not look away from the path, and for a while they rode in silence. It wasn’t until that night, as they sat around the campfire, their mounts grazing on clover and Hauwen gleefully stomping in mud.

“Your brother. Athim. What was he like?”

“Quiet,” Falon said without a second thought. “Always busy, since he had to study magic, but always making time to keep me out of trouble.”

“Did you make trouble often?”

“Not too often,” Falon said. “When we were much younger, sure. Sometimes us kids would play tricks on each other. Like one time, I found a big spider and I put it in this girl’s things—”

“Why would you do that?”

“I was eight,” Falon said, certain that explained everything. “Anyway, I put the spider in her aravel, so she went and put a muskrat in mine, except Athim and I shared everything from clothes to food and so he’s the one who found it. Screamed for a whole minute.”

“Ah.”

“I mean, a muskrat. Honestly. I think they’re sort of cute.”

Abelas nodded in a way that made Falon think he hadn’t actually seen one, and was just trying to be polite.

“It’s hard to sum up, you know. We spent so much time together – I even tried to join in his magic lessons, and when our First told me to stop I’d sneak around and listen in anyway. And in turn he always wanted to come with me when I left to gather supplies, or to hunt, even though he was shit at shooting. We protected each other as best we could.”

Unfortunately for Athim, Falon thought, his best wasn’t enough.

Abelas watched Falon intently, and said, “ _Ir abelas_.”

“Why is that?”

“That you lost your brother.”

He’d lost much more than that, but Falon nodded appreciatively all the same. “I’m sorry too.”


	4. Now

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The modern world is confusing.

They needed salt.

Falon had said as much a few days prior, and said the next inn or tavern they crossed he’d have to trade for supplies. Abelas didn’t know much about the world outside of Mythal’s temple, and had never bartered with the shemlen. It was better to observe, to learn.

Falon changed out of his armor, and Abelas saw long scars up and down his back, and a puncture that ran through his collar just shy of his throat. His hands, Abelas had noticed long before, were covered in thin scars and green stained.

Abelas watched as he changed into a plain, dark-colored shirt and began to tie a band over his forehead.

“Why are you doing that?” Abelas asked, nodding to Falon as he touched his headband.

“As far as they know,” he said, “We’re two Dalish elves away from our clan. And you’re an apostate. Shemlen don’t like either of those things.”

“You’ve dealt with Shemlen before,” Abelas noted. “You entered Mythal’s temple with two.”

Falon snorted. “And before that, when I dealt with Shemlen they set their dogs on me and my clan, or tried to burn us out of the woods, or called me a knife-ear or a savage and turned a crossbow on me. And them? They’re not going to care that you’re ancient. They’re going to see pointy ears and Mythal and your chin a little too high, and they’ll do the same to you.”

Abelas considered, for a moment, and began to weave mana through his fingertips, casting a simple illusion that concealed his vallaslin from view. He offered a hand to Falon, meaning to do the same.

Falon stood stone-still.

“It would be more effective than that strip of cloth.”

Eventually, he relented, and moved closer. Abelas cast his spell and pressed the tips of his fingers to Falon’s forehead, focused, and pulled the markings through the veil. It was such a strange thing, to have to cross the veil to access his magic when it had once been as salient as the wind.

He used another spell to conjure a reflection in the palm of his hand, which he showed to the now-bare-faced Falon. He watched as Falon’s brow furrowed, as he ran his finger to his cheek where the branches of Mythal’s tree once encircled his eyes.

He shook his head, hard. All he could see was Athim.

“No. Put it back.”

“It’s only an illusion,” Abelas said. “It’s still there.”

“I don’t care. Put it back.”

Abelas squinted at Falon, trying to see what mistake he’d made. He found none. Falon’s skin was the same ochre it had always been, his eyes as green as raw glass, just as they’d been the first he saw him. Not a hair out of place, only a thin scar from the swell of his cheek running through his lip and down across his chin – a scar he’d received fighting the former Templar in Mythal’s temple.

“Abelas. Please.”

“As you wish,” he said. He released his spell, and watched as Falon’s furrowed brow relaxed as the branches reappeared on his forehead.

“I just…I’m going to go get our supplies.”

\---

Falon left his weapons with Abelas before even approaching the tavern. When Abelas stared at him, confused, he explained, “Elves don’t carry weapons, and I don’t want to cause a stir.”

Abelas gave a quick harrumph and turned his head to the side. “Even Dalish elves?”

“Are you worried?” Falon asked. He reached down to his boot and produced a knife that equaled his palm and middle finger in length, gave it a quick spin, and concealed it again. “Don’t. I won’t need it.”

Abelas nodded. Falon could feel the ancient elf’s eyes on the back of his head, but he didn’t dare look back.

When Clan Lavellan still walked the Marches, Falon had only few experiences with human settlements. Mostly, he and the other children crept behind whichever adult had volunteered to approach and broker a trade. Meat for medicine, or herbs for salt, pelts for pots and pans. Whatever they had excess of was quickly traded in for essentials, and they lived on little. If their forage was good, they traded the excess. Deshanna didn’t much care for coin. It didn’t expire but it wasn’t immediately useful, particularly if they couldn’t find anyone to trade with.

Falon had seen how humans traded with “wild” elves. He hoped the coin was enough.

He walked into a tavern, his hood up and his markings only partially hidden by the strip of cloth he’d tied around his head. He slid up to the counter and, to his delight, saw an elven dishwasher off to the side.

“Hey. Cousin,” he called.

The dishwasher’s head spun, and his freckled face went pale as he saw Falon at the counter. He shook his head, and pointed to the human man tending the bar.

Falon pursed his lips, frustrated, but if the dishwasher wasn’t brave enough to leave his work for a few minutes he probably wasn’t brave enough to mediate a trade. Falon waited for the bartender to take notice of him, watching as a few humans who approached the bar later than him took their drinks, and a refill, before the bartender finally approached and said, “What do you want?”

He’d just watched the man be warm and friendly with four other customers, some drunk, some dressed in rags.

“Do you own this place, Ser?”

“I do. What about it?”

“I’m travelling with a few companions and was hoping to trade for salt.”

The man snorted. “We don’t _trade_ , here, elf.”

Falon slipped a few silvers from his pocket and slid it across the counter. “Purchase, then.”

The bartender stared down a bulbous nose at Falon, and finally he snapped, “Take that hood off, elf, you’re not fooling anyone.”

Falon obliged, pulling his hood back and exposing his face to the light. The man stared at Falon, and in a flash he’d reached over the counter and pulled the headband from Falon’s head. A few patrons peeked up from their drinks to see Falon’s face, marked with Mythal. Falon heard one patron snort as his beer came up through his nose.

In Orlais, and Ferelden, people learned to tolerate him. But they were back in the Marches now, with none of the Inquisition’s clout to shield them, and people did not know the Dalish except as wild elves who sometimes strayed too near civilization.

“Only looking to purchase some salt, Ser, if you’ve any you can spare for sale.”

Falon could see the dishwasher’s jaw drop as he saw the markings on Falon’s face, and he heard his yelp of, “A Dalish?!” before he clapped a hand over his own mouth and buried his head in his work. Falon felt the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end, but he kept quiet and stern.

“Andraste’s knickers,” the bartender said. “This some sort of joke?”

“No ser. I just need half a pound of salt, if you can sell.”

“Corin,” the bartender snapped over his shoulder. “You heard him, your ears are big enough.”

The dishwasher skittered off in search of the salt, and Falon resisted the urge to express his relief. “How much, then?”

“A sovereign.”

That was too much. Probably a year’s wages for the dishwasher over there. Falon cocked a brow. He was tempted to cuss at the man for such an offer, just out of principle.

 “A sovereign,” he repeated. “For half a pound?”

“You got lint in your ears, boy?” the bartender said. “That’s what I said.”

Falon reached inside of his pocket and produced a single gold coin, held tight between his fingers while he waited for the dishwasher to arrive with the salt. He took the sack, peered inside. Rock salt. Good enough, he could grind it himself.

“Fine. Silver’s for you, Ser Corin,” Falon said, leaving the sovereign on the counter.

He could not have gotten out of there quickly enough. He met Abelas back in the woods, where their mounts were grazing on swamp grass. Abelas sat, his eyes glowing a faint silver, against a tree. The glow dissipated as Falon approached.

“Were you watching me?”

Abelas regarded Falon, his expression hard and unreadable. Falon felt a wrench in his gut, tossed the salt into Abelas’s lap and pulled his scabbards from beside the tree. He said nothing as he refitted the weapons on his hips.

“How much is a sovereign?”

“A season’s wages for some people,” Falon said.

“Is salt so expensive?”

“No,” Falon said.

Abelas quirked his shaven brow. “Then why did you pay it?”

“Didn’t seem worth the trouble of stealing it,” Falon replied. “Let’s go. Didn’t like the looks I got.”

“If you had let me cast my spell,” Abelas said—

Falon interrupted. “I earned this,” he said, pointing to his Vallas’lin. “Why should I hide it?”

Abelas stared at him, his brow furrowed tightly. “Do you know what it means?”

“I know what it means _now_ ,” Falon said, his voice harder than he meant for it to be. “I know what it meant to my clan. Do _you?”_

Abelas said nothing, and Falon mounted his hart and waited impatiently for Abelas to mount his horse.

They rode in silence for hours before Abelas finally asked, “And what do they mean to your clan?”

Falon slowed his mount so he rode directly beside Abelas, and said, “It’s a rite of passage. Some craft a bow or staff of ironbark. Some hunt alone. That’s what I did. It means I survived long enough to earn it. Not everyone does.”

Abelas considered this, and asked, “But if it puts you in danger, wouldn’t it make sense to hide them?”

Falon shrugged, his fingers digging into Hawen’s strong shoulders as they rode. “I’m finished hiding.”


	5. Spirits and Demons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Culture shock is a bitch.

Abelas slept with his arms crossed, usually propped up against a tree or a rock. Falon tried not to laugh when he realized Abelas had fallen asleep upright on his horse, just prodded him in the shoulder to wake him suggested they stop for the night.

In Abelas’s defense, he didn’t comment when Falon muttered to his hart or stopped to gather useful herbs and edible mushrooms, which was more than Falon could say for _some_ of his travelling companions. Dorian, Solas and Sera each used to tease him. Varric at least was gentle, reminding him that there was plenty of food for them with the troops. At least Cole understood _why_ he did it, out of habit, an abundance of practicality, and to distract himself in times of stress. Sometimes he was just curious as he encountered a plant he’d never seen before, except in textbooks, and even Vivienne didn’t fault him for that.

The only time Abelas commented on any of Falon’s habits was when Falon grit his teeth and clenched his left fist as a sting travelled up his left arm.

“Are you alright?”

Falon held the anchor up so Abelas could see, and said, “It does that, from time to time.”

Abelas nodded. “Does it often pain you?”

“Not usually,” Falon said. “We might be near a rift. That sets it off, sometimes.”

“A rift?”

“You haven’t seen one, have you?” Falon said. “We closed, Gods, at least a hundred by now. All over Orlais and Ferelden, and Dirthaven. They’re these tears in the Veil, and stuff comes pouring through or gets stuck on the other side.” Falon cocked his head and listened. He could feel the hairs on his neck raising as his ears tipped due East. “Let’s go. We can try and shut it. That should shut this thing up.”

“Very well,” Abelas said. He gave Buerre a little squeeze and together they trotted off towards the source.

The rift in question was a small one, guarded by a huge, lumbering Pride demon who dragged its knuckles on the ground, pacing a perimeter of burnt trees and scorched soil. Dead animals and humanoid bodies alike littered the ground, their faces varying degrees of crushed and their entrails spilled. The smell was awful enough that Falon pulled his scarf up to cover his face.

“Hauwen, stay,” Falon warned as he climbed from his Hart’s back, pulling a short sword from his pack and pacing along the side. Abelas began to follow, a spell silencing his footsteps so he wouldn’t draw attention.

Falon knew very little about the types of spells Abelas could cast, or how he might use them to fight. It was only one demon so far. Falon took a deep breath.

He waited for the demon’s back to turn towards him and rushed up as quickly as he could, threw himself on the beast’s back and dug the sword deep between his shoulders. Then, while it reared back and wailed, Falon threw the anchor towards the rift and yanked on it like a taut bowstring.

 The demon recoiled, throwing Falon to the ground. He tucked his chin in to shield his head as he struck the ground and forced himself to roll, ignoring the screaming in his ribs as he stood. Abelas was quick to seize the moment by hammering it with a forceful burst of magic. As the demon staggered back, Falon leapt up, grabbed hold of his sword and kicked off the demon’s back, landing on the balls of his feet.

He threw his ball chain so it looped around one leg and darted to the other side of a tree, tugging the chain with all his might.

The demon toppled to the ground, and Abelas skewered it on a pillar of ice.

Falon could feel the rift seizing up behind him, and he spun quickly and sealed it shut before any more could make it through.

“There,” Falon said, shaking the blood from his sword. “That wasn’t so bad.”

Abelas was quick to heal the scratches and bruises Falon had received from his fall, but like Dorian and Vivienne there was nothing he could do for the mark. Instead he asked, “How is your hand?”

Falon cocked his head. “A bit sore, kind of _itchy_. Nothing too bad though.”

Abelas nodded. “Should we move on?”

“Let’s.”

\--

“What is that you keep drinking?”

Falon glanced back to Abelas. He’d been taking a potion for nearly a year now to stop him dreaming, ever since he’d been plagued with nightmares of the Fade and Corypheus’s face, in addition to the usual ones about his brother. Everything had piled on and gotten worse, and now even the good dreams were painful, disorienting even.  

He simplified the answer, “Something to help me sleep. And some tea.”

Abelas gave no reaction. “You’ve almost exhausted your supply.”

Falon already knew, but he supposed this was Abelas’s way of expressing concern. Maybe of asking what would happen when the supply was spent. Falon couldn’t find enough of the herbs he needed to brew into the proper potion, and he didn’t have the type of equipment he had back in Skyhold to make it efficiently. It was all a crapshoot cooking it down over a fire, no guarantee it would work right. Vivienne had always insisted on doing things _properly_ or not at all, and now Falon had gotten that into his head. At least when it came to his alchemy.

“Can you sleep without it?”

“We’ll see,” Falon muttered.

Sure enough, the potion ran out the next night, and Falon didn’t have enough to brew a proper batch. He’d rather save the herbs for when he’d have access to a better setup, and they were close. They’d reach Wycome in just a week now. He could sleep lightly for a few days if needed.

So the first night in nearly a year when Falon had gone to bed without first taking a potion, he found it easy enough to doze off.

It wasn’t until he woke to Abelas shaking him awake that he realized how bad it was, that without the potion he sweat and shook like a morning leaf. He couldn’t even remember what he was dreaming about when he woke.

“Are you alright?”

Falon nodded absently. Abelas’s face was not stoic as usual, but warped. The branches of his vallaslin knotted where his brow did.

“Just a bad dream.”

“Is this what happens when you sleep without your tea?”

Falon supposed he wouldn’t be able to hide it for long. He nodded, and rose to his feet. “Guess I might as well take a turn at watch, since I’m up. You go ahead and sleep.”

“Is it possible you’ve attracted a spirit?”

Falon cocked his head. He had, at least at one point, fallen prey to Nightmare, that demon the Grey Wardens almost pulled through to the other side. But they’d fought Nightmare, and what Falon had lost he reclaimed, and what was stolen was restored. But then again, his nightmare were not exclusive to his time in the Inquisition.

But, he decided, “Solas wouldn’t have shut up about it if that were the case. It’s nothing to do with spirits or demons – just nerves.”

Abelas shook his head. “You speak as if those are exclusive.”

“Alright. Say it is a persistent spirit. How do I get rid of it?”

“You would need to confront it in the Fade.”

“Ah,” Falon muttered. “Well, I can’t just enter the Fade.”

Abelas looked pensive. “Can’t you?”

Falon cocked his head.

“You have that mark, and it is connected to the Fade, and the Veil between it and this world. Is it not within your capability to create openings, if it is within your capability to close them?”

“I—”

Falon paused. He had opened rifts before, even passed through one, though that time he had acted purely on instinct. He wondered if he even could tear the veil intentionally, and if he’d be able to leave again if he did.

“I’m not sure,” he said. “There were other factors at play the last time…and I didn’t do it on purpose. I was falling and it just…”

Falon caught the look on Abelas’s face. He looked puzzled.

“Sorry. I’m not making any sense, am I?” He didn’t wait for Abelas to reply, instead stretching his back and stepping from the tent. “I’ll take my watch. At least _one_ of us should get some rest.”

He left before Abelas could respond.

\---

“So,” Falon said over a breakfast of more salted meat, “What would I do, if I were to confront this spirit?”

“Ask it to leave,” Abelas said.

“How do I know it’s the right one?”

Abelas said something in such a tone that Falon _knew_ it was profane, and he filed it away in the back of his mind for future use. Something he’d get to yell at Solas if he ever saw him again. “How could you confront the wrong spirit?”

“I’ve been to the Fade twice, and neither time was intentional.”

“You speak strangely.”

Falon felt tempted to remind Abelas who the _real_ strange one was here, in this time, but he shrugged and took a bite of his food instead.

 He was disappointed in himself to find that he sort of missed the fat-drenched breakfasts he’d had in Orlais, a buttery pastry filled with tart jam alongside crispy fried eggs. He wasn’t going to replicate that over an open fire, but he decided it would be on the agenda for when all this was through. A good, excessive breakfast filled with pastries and jams of every type.

“In any case,” Abelas continued, “You would want to find whichever spirit is tailing you and make amends, if you have wronged it. Or perhaps even if you have not wronged it. If the spirit is benign, it should accept your gesture, and leave you be.”

“And what if it’s more malicious?” Falon asked, recalling his time in Nightmare’s lair.

“Then you will likely be forced to kill it.”

Falon couldn’t help but laugh.

\---

“May I enter your dream?” Abelas asked before bed one night. Falon must have looked confused, because Abelas quickly became exasperated and said in his most beleaguered tone of voice, “Would you be opposed to it, if I did?”

“I can’t really stop you, can I?” Falon asked. “If I have a dream and you’re in it, I can’t just make you go away.”

Abelas’s brow was knitted tightly over his nose, and his broad nostrils flared dramatically. Oh. They were not understanding each other at all.

“If I enter your dream,” Abelas said, “I may be able to determine the nature of your spirit.”

“Could probably ask Cole, if he were here,” Falon muttered.

Abelas’s lips parted. “Who is… _Cole?”_

“He’s a…well he’s a spirit who turned into a human. Kind of.”

Abelas nodded, as if this made sense to him. He laid down on his bedroll, facing the sky, and said, “You are very strange.”

Falon replied, “Didn’t anyone ever tell you it’s rude to call people strange?”

“ _Ir abelas,”_ Abelas answered. “This _time_ is very strange.”

He wasn’t wrong.

\---

Falon’s dreams were disorganized and convoluted, Abelas decided. There were sections that were loud and raucous but plagued with an overwhelming sensation of Despair, filled with wild elves playing drums and stringing lutes and mandolins and blowing flutes and horns with glee that brought nothing but a sense of dread and empty. Others were less confusing, a long winding road through every element with no seeming end. Fear.

Rage followed visions of a very young elf in Dalish clothes, wielding a plain staff of sylvanwood and trotting happily along. This, at least, Abelas could understand – that Falon carried Rage for the death of his brother. That lingering notes of Despair and Sadness were overwhelming. That whenever Athim smiled, his teeth were bloody and each of these things ran through Abelas.

Abelas moved on.

A space of Confusion came when Falon confronted a warped, deform creature with red crystals jutting from his face and hands, a giant, rotten dragon breathing down on him as he stood alone, bearing a sword too large for him, declaring in a trembling voice that he was not afraid.

But he was, until he saw a tiny speck of glitter to the distance and everything washed away. He kicked at the lever to the contraption behind him, and the mountain fell on them both.

In another dream, he followed a Halla, a quieter dream, one with few emotions to speak of, and it led him to a deep marsh. Falon looked in, and saw something that brought Fear.

Rotten gnarled hands reached up to pull him down, and though he struggled and fought, he was dragged under the surface as it turned to glass, trapping him below.

Regret filled memories about the Inquisition, about Falon striking Solas and shouting at Sera. About telling the dwarf that Hawke was dead, about telling a human woman in a gold shirt that they did not have the resources. About receiving a letter—that one was overwhelming Despair and Rage and Loss.

Abelas woke abruptly, to find Falon laying beside him, his hands shaking.

There was so much more, buried even deeper, he could see that the Vir’abelasan permeated some parts of Falon’s dreaming mind, but Abelas found himself exhausted from even what little he had found.

When Falon woke the next morning, and asked Abelas, “So what did you find?”

He struggled.

“There is…much.”

“Much what?”

Everything.

“Well, don't worry about it. A few days of bad sleep won’t kill me.”

Abelas looked over Falon, who shrugged and smiled and carried on as though he did not carry _so many_ things.


	6. Survivors

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Falon finds a survivor of his clan's massacre.

Falon had, over the years, developed an uncanny ability to sleep sitting up while riding. It was the soundest he ever slept, lulled by the steady shifting of his mount. Abelas seemed relieved to see him sleeping.

Falon glanced around. “We’re getting closer.”

“I see no city,” Abelas said.

“The city’s further off, still,” Falon said. “I meant to where my clan was when I left.”

“Ah.”

Falon bristled, expecting some snide comment. He told himself he didn’t give a damn what Abelas thought, that they weren’t of the same people, that they were shadows clinging to scraps, but he found himself bracing for the insult all the same.

Fortunately, Abelas cared enough to restrain himself, and said nothing further.

“I need to bury them,” Falon said. He needed to see if any of their things had survived, even though he knew in the pit of his stomach that humans who came to purge Dalish camps rarely left anything behind. But he at least had faith in Deshanna, and in his father, that they might have squirreled away whatever was important.

“If you must,” Abelas said.

His voice revealed little, but Falon reflexively shot back, “You don’t have to come.”

Abelas’s lips thinned ever so slightly, and his ears quirked downwards. “Do you prefer that I remain?”

Falon shook his head. “You don’t have to stay behind either.”

Abelas paused.

“What would you ask of me?”

“If you can manage, a bit of quiet,” Falon muttered. He didn’t want to hear one more time about how wrong his clan’s burial rituals were. 

He spotted over a ridge a stone idol of Fen’Harel, facing away from the camp. He climbed from Hawen, and avoided eye contact with Abelas as he paced towards it. He let his fingers brush against the Dread Wolf’s skull as he passed, silently bitter that he hadn’t saved the misfortune for Clan Lavellan’s attackers.

But Abelas followed silently, dismounting as Falon did. It wasn’t too long until they passed unhindered to the site where the camp was. The smells Falon had come to expect when reentering his clan, spiced meat over a wooden fire, herbs brewing in a pot, incense and varnish, were absent. It had been too long to expect the awful stench of death, but a musty, fungal smell permeated the camp. The aravels which normally prodded at the canopy above were overturned, the sails bare and broken, and the wood charred black and rotten.

His breath hitched.

He knew it would be like this, but that didn’t make it any easier to see.

Abelas approached from his left, squinting as he peered over what was left of the camp.

“What needs to be done?”

“I’m going to gather whatever bodies I can find and lay them to rest,” Falon said. “You don’t have to do anything.”

Abelas nodded, and stayed back as Falon began his search.

\--

The first body Falon found had a bashed in skull and an arrow where the throat once was. Maggots and carrion birds had stripped the flesh, soldiers almost all of the jewelry. But there was a wooden ring on this one’s upper arm, probably too stuck from blood and guts to remove. Falon took out his notebook, and wrote, _Tian_ , and moved the body onto a wooden cart so she’d be easier to bury.

Next came a small body. There were only two young children in this clan. It was either Ashia or Andria, and there was nothing to differentiate them by. Not anymore. The back of her skull was caved in. Falon hauled the body onto the cart, marked off the two names and put a question mark beside them. He did not have to question for long, because hidden under a cart was a body with a broken arm. They’d hidden together, and they’d died together.

It was sickening at first, and Abelas stopped Falon after he lost his stomach, several bodies in. He insisted he drink something, but Falon narrowed his eyes and said, “Why, so I can throw it back up?”

Abelas, at that point, began to assist silently. Falon or Abelas would spy a body, Falon would see if he could identify it by jewelry or weaponry, but only a few had anything left. Anything of value was stripped, and their clothing was so decayed and rotten from a year of clinging to maggot-filled corpseflesh that Falon couldn’t identify a soul by it.

“This one’s missing a finger,” Abelas said.

Falon couldn’t remember anyone of his clan missing a single finger, so he approached where Abelas stood and saw, in a circle of grass much shorter than everything else, the body of a small woman with a crooked spine.

“That was Keeper Deshanna,” he said. “They must have cut off her finger to get the ring.”

Even Abelas looked disgusted by the notion, and he scowled deeply.

“She must have put up some sort of barrier, until it broke,” Falon said, eyeing the grass. He wondered how many of the mercenaries she’d killed before she fell. But the shemlen at least took their own people’s bodies, so there were few left to find.

By the end of the evening, Falon had counted twenty-eight bodies. Less than the total number of his clan, which gave him some shallow hope that a few might have escaped. It was difficult to name all of the bodies, but he wrote the names of all the clan he couldn’t identify. His father’s name fell on that list.

Creators, he might still be alive if that was the case.

“What is it you’re writing?” Abelas asked.

“A list of names,” Falon said. “To see that everyone’s accounted for.”

“Are they?”

“My clan was just shy of forty, and there are just shy of thirty elven bodies here,” Falon said. There had been more human bodies, he was certain of, but humans didn’t leave their own people for the dogs and maggots and crows. Those might have been the other bodies he was told of in the report, a few soldiers mistaken for the civilians they attacked.

Abelas regarded Falon warily. “But is it wise to take that as a sign of their survival?”

Falon knew that it probably wasn’t. “If there were any templars in the attack, it’s possible they took our First alive…a few of the hunters aren’t accounted for. They might have been out hunting or foraging during the attack, so they could have escaped.”

“Would it not be equally likely that some died here but were eaten or dragged away by scavengers?”

Falon couldn’t argue that. “I don’t know. I can’t even tell all of the ones we found apart.”

Abelas’s brows quirked as he looked to Falon, and Falon was suddenly hyper conscious of how hot his face was, of how puffy his cheeks felt. He took a deep breath through his nostrils and on the exhale he felt a quiver in his throat.

Abelas reached out and took his hand. “It will be dark soon. Let us rest for the night, away from here.”

Falon let Abelas lead him away.

\---

Falon slept as badly as ever while Abelas watched, and mercifully Abelas woke him from his renewed nightmare wherein he followed his brother to a lake, watched his brother sink in, and when he reached in to grab him before he could drown he was seized by dozens of rotting, decrepit hands.

When he woke to Abelas shaking him, he nearly punched him in the face. Abelas dodged out of the way, and Falon apologized profusely – “I’m so sorry—I didn’t hit you, did I?”

Abelas shook his head. “ _Peace, friend,_ ” he said in elvhen. “ _No harm, no harm.”_

Falon sat up and ran a hand through his hair. Abelas gave him some space.

“I think that’s about all the sleep I’m getting tonight,” Falon muttered. “Why don’t you take the tent and I’ll keep watch.”

It wasn’t a question, and Abelas knew that. He seemed reluctant, but eventually relented and took the tent while Falon moved outside and walked to the nearby creak, where he dipped his hands in the chilly water and ran them over his face and neck to rid himself of some of the sweat. He needed a real bath when he got back, he decided, if he got back. He probably stunk at this point.

He looked at his reflection in the water.

He looked awful. His eyes were sunken and puffy and dark, and his cheeks were hollow and faint. If he’d aged a few years, he looked like he’d aged a few decades.

He heard a branch snap and his head snapped up in time to see a white deer – a halla – with long horns that ended in the onset of a braid, and then a crack.

One of the clan’s halla.

She looked at him curiously, sniffing the air. She moved towards him, and Falon sat perfectly still, worried he might spook her. The closer she moved, the more he realized how hard the past year must have been for her as well, as she was covered in matted fur and ticks and a long scar ran up her rear left leg, which she let on the ground only sparingly.

She sniffed him up close, and began to chew at his shirt. He dug in his pockets for a bit of fruit and held it out in an open palm, and she ate it quickly, ravenously.

“Life hasn’t been easy for you either, has it?” Falon asked.

She didn’t answer, but she gave him a nuzzle and began to trot along the creek.

Falon’s instinct was to follow her, but he’d already left Abelas alone, and if something happened, if he were set upon by predators or bandits or _worse,_ Venatori, then he’d be at fault.

She paused, and waited, waited to see if he would follow.

Falon couldn’t leave Abelas.

“ _I’m sorry,”_ he said. “I’ll bring more fruit for you tomorrow.”

She continued down the creek without him.

\---

“There are halla here,” Falon said when Abelas finally roused. Falon had occupied himself the rest of the night by sharpening his knives and cooking up a young squash he’d found on his way back from the creek.

Abelas nodded, still drowsy it seemed. Falon had partially hollowed out the squash so he could fill the inside with fruit and mushrooms and a few eggs he was fortunate to find in a low branch, and he sliced it open the rest of the way and offered some to his companion.

“Oh. That is…nice.”

Falon rolled his eyes. “ _Tame_ halla. With braided horns.”

“Who is braiding their horns?” Abelas yawned between bites of his breakfast.

“No one, anymore.”

“This is good,” Abelas said, continuing to eat.

“One of them tried to get me to follow her, but I was keeping watch, so I couldn’t. I want to look for her, see where she was leading me.”

Abelas paused his breakfast to say, “She is a _deer,”_ as if that was contrary to all Falon had said.

“I’m aware,” Falon said. “And Hauwen is a hart. _He’s_ not unintelligent.”

“He is an animal,” Abelas said.

“And?” Falon asked.

Abelas looked particularly exasperated. “Animals are simple. They are not leading you anywhere.”

“The halla lead our clans all the time.”

Abelas looked particularly unenthused by this point. “They lead you as the seasons lead them, perhaps, but they are following instinct. She is not _leading_ you to anything but perhaps a good watering hole.”

“Then there’s no harm in following her, is there?” Falon said. “Because I’m going to go back and track her. If _she’s_ alive, then maybe—”

“I think you are putting too much stock in this creature.”

Falon scowled. “Well, _I_ think I’m putting too much stock in what _you_ think. Dread Wolf’s ballsack, you’re as thick-headed as the shemlen.”

Abelas scowled deeply.

Falon finished his own breakfast quickly and stood, whistled for Hauwen to follow, and said, “Shoot some lights into the air if you need me and watch your horse then. Creators know I don’t need any of this right now.”

\---

The halla, fortunately, was easy to track, since her hoofprints were clear in the mud beside the stream. It took Falon little effort to track her to a ravine. He wondered what he would find on the end, a gaggle of survivors not too far off, just waiting for him to return, a herd of halla waiting for their keepers. Eventually, he saw her, grazing alongside the creek. She approached cautiously, took a bit of food when Falon offered it, and began to trot further down.

As the ravine deepened, the creek ran faster, and Falon could see scorch marks and sword cuts along the walls. This must have been the source of some battle, he thought, and as he saw marks from lightening and fire and crossbow bolts stuck in the mud he knew he had to be getting close, he knew his father must have been near.

He nearly tripped over a skull, a human skull, in the mud, eerily clean from resting in the riverbed he supposed. But there were more, and as he walked, the scorch marks only got more wild and frantic.

His heart raced. He had to be getting closer to whatever it was. And he came to a cave formed by earth pulled from above and fallen trees, held together by roots pulled down by magic. It had to be magic, it had to be _his_ father’s magic. He entered, one hand on his knife just in case, pleading with Mythal to let him see his father one more time.

He came upon a ring of dozens of armored corpses, and one still figure perched on a stone, a crossbow bolt through his heart, surrounded by scorch marks, and ragged earth, bearing a familiar staff.

Falon knew the moment he saw it that it could only have been Revassan’s – a sylvanwood staff that twisted together towards a piece of obsidian at the top, and held it as if prey in an eagle’s claw. The First had carried it for as long as Falon could remember, back when Athim was still young. Revassan had also tied beaded braids around the staff, one for his wife, Falon’s mother, when she passed, and one for Athim.

Falon stepped over the bodies towards the body of his father, still decomposing, no longer recognizable. He’d be one with the weeds like the rest of the corpses if he hadn’t died perched up on that stone, in an almost meditative pose.

Falon laid his hands on the staff. It didn’t feel like anything but a heavy stick to him, it never had. Athim had always been able to tell what sorts of energies it favored, and how it pulled through the veil, but Athim had magic and Falon did not, and so he knew he would have nothing of his father but his memory.

He clutched the staff tightly, and found himself on his knees, cradling all that was left of his father while he wept.

He could have stayed there forever, if it weren’t for Abelas placing a hand on his shoulder.

“I think it is time to leave,” he said.

Falon didn’t know when Abelas had deigned to follow him, and was unsure how he did not hear him, but he did not care.

Falon shook his head. “I thought he might have made it. I thought—”

“He’s gone.”

Falon sniffed. “I know. I know…”

Abelas let his hand rest on Falon’s shoulder for a moment, and it was another empty gesture, another person pretending to mourn when Falon well knew the only people who mourned the deaths of Dalish elves were those Dalish elves who survived them. He shrugged Abelas’s hand off.

“I don’t know much about what things were like in your time,” Falon said, “But _this_ is what being Dalish is.”

He stood, using the staff to steady himself. It was too light to be used to bludgeon, too dull to be used to pierce. It was as useless to him as he felt.

Abelas was stone-faced as he always was. “Come. Let’s bury your people and be gone from here.”

\---

Falon could tell from Abelas’s expression that the burials as the Dalish performed them were not as his people performed them. But he didn’t have a crypt at his disposal, not here, and so the only other option was to bury his people, one by one, and plant a tree over each one.

“An oak staff and a cedar branch.”

“There are twenty-nine bodies here,” Abelas muttered.

“Then I’ll need twenty-nine of them.”

Abelas shook his head. “That will take you days.”

“Then I’ll be here a while. You don’t have to stay. You’re welcome to continue to Wycome without me, or go anywhere else.”

Abelas scoffed. “Is this how your people think—”

“Do you see a crypt? Do you see any empty sarcophagi?” Falon shot back. “We do what we can with what we have.”

“Then are thirty separate branches and staves necessary?”

Falon huffed. “I don’t know. I’ve never been to a funeral for thirty people before. I’d ask Keeper Deshanna, but, well, she’s indisposed.”

Abelas barely reacted. “You have a strange sense of humor.”

“It’s called gallows humor, and it’s not that strange,” Falon muttered. “It’s going to be a while, Abelas. You don’t have to stay.”

Abelas sighed. “I will stay. Go search for your staves. I’ll make the graves.”

Abelas had finished the graves well before Falon had finished gathering the seeds and staves he needed. He’d used his spells to move the earth, and then to move the corpses. There were a few plain staves still buried in one of the aravels, strong enough. The rest he chose from large branches on the forest floor. The cedar branch, he decided, would still serve, even if he only had one.

While he was searching the aravels, he found an old, leather bound book with elvhen letters on the side, and he knew it was Deshanna’s. He exited with it clutched close to his chest. “Where are the saddlebags – I need to put this away.”

“What is that?”

“Deshanna’s book,” he said. It wouldn’t be of much use to him, he knew it was mostly writings on magic and rituals. But to another clan…

He realized that the Well might have given him some semblance of literacy in elvhen, even though what he knew himself was slapdash and incomplete at best. He might be able to read it, now, if he tried.

Abelas nodded to his left, where the horse and hart grazed. The saddlebags laid over a nearby log. Falon tucked the book away and sighed wearily. “This is as much as I could find – and these are to plant on the graves.”

Falon began placing each of the seeds over the graves, and set an oaken staff between the rows of four when one was not available. “ _Ir abelas, lethallin_ , it looks like even in death you’ll have to share.”

He knew the songs to sing when someone died, and he did it by himself, quietly, while Abelas waited behind, and he tried not to think about what it would mean if there was nothing in death but void, and then he pushed the thoughts of what it meant to be so late to give a funeral.

He finished, “Dirthamin enasalin…Falon’din enasalin,” as he tied the cedar branch to the tallest of the oaken staves.

He felt dread pooling in the pit of his stomach, knowing it was over, knowing there was no one left to correct him if he’d sang the songs wrong or compromised too heavily on the burial.

Abelas walked among the graves and stretched out a hand, and with a quiet word and a flash of light, the seeds on each grave sprouted into little saplings. Falon didn’t say it, but it was what his father had done over Athim’s grave, and the sight gave him the faintest hope that his clan’s death wasn’t the ending he feared it was.

“Thank you,” Falon said.

Abelas nodded, and returned to his horse.

Falon gave one last look over the graves, and said, “Never again shall we submit. I won’t let this happen again.”


	7. Strangers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Falon and Abelas reach Wycome.

“We should stable our mounts before we reach Wycome. There’s probably a smaller village around here, or a roadstop where we could leave them…”

“Why not stable them in Wycome?”

“Because in Wycome, they’ll have an alienage,” Falon muttered, “And elves who live in the alienage don’t have horses, and elves aren’t allowed outside the alienage unless it’s to work.”

“Have you been inside of one?” Abelas asked.

“No,” Falon admitted, “But every now and again, our clan would pick up one of our lost cousins who’d come out to the woods looking for us—” or to die, as one young woman their clan had done before Deshanna found her. “And they told us stories.”

“More stories,” Abelas muttered.

“Well here’s another story for you – city folk think we Dalish are savage killers, if they think we exist at all.”

“We?”

“Yes, ‘we,’” Falon retorted. “Or do you think the humans will stop to ask if your Vallas’lin is Dalish or ancient?”

Abelas nodded. “That is true enough.”

“Sometimes city elves are just as afraid of us as the shemlen. And you’re a mage, so they’re going to be doubly wary of you. We should leave your staff with the horses.”

“What about yours?” Abelas said. “Are they going to ask if you are a mage before they cast judgement on you?”

Falon nodded mutely.

“The alternative,” Falon said, “Is that we could enter as a party to the Inquisition.”

“That would seem the better option.”

Falon scrunched his nose. “Except it’s a lie.”

Abelas quirked his brow, which had grown back sparsely after a few weeks on the road with little means of shaving them away.

“What are your true intentions, then?”

“To kill the damned bastards who murdered my clan. Every single one of them.”

Abelas frowned.

“You don’t have to help,” Falon said. “You can leave if you prefer. Take a ship back to Ferelden or Orlais, or stay here. I’ll even pay your fare. Doesn’t matter to me.”

“I did not say I would not help,” Abelas said quietly.

Falon cocked his head. “You don’t seem like you approve either. If you don’t want to come, you shouldn’t.”

“You could not make me do anything I did not want to,” Abelas said sternly. “Let us find a stable.”

\--

Falon hated leaving Hauwen behind. He found himself hesitant to leave the stable, and more hesitant to leave Hauwen’s stall, and even more so to take his hands from his snout. Abelas had no such compunctions about leaving Buerre, simply removed her tack and left.

“He’ll be here when we return. It’s not as if anyone else can ride him.”

“That’s true…” Falon muttered. “And don’t you let them, Hauwen, if they try. You bite them as hard as you can.”

\--

The second they came upon the city gates, the guards stopped them. “Hoods down.”

Falon lowered his hood, revealing his Vallas’lin, and Abelas did as well. The guards squinted at them, exchanged a glance, and Falon tensed, expecting a fight.

But instead, the guard said, “Alienage is up that road. Market’s open to your kind during the day, but after sundown it’s the alienage or the pits. You make trouble, it’s right to the pits, and then the gallows.”

Falon nodded, and started down the road without another word, hoping their welcome to the alienage would be a little less threatening. He stopped when he realized the guards had thrown up an arm to stop Abelas.

“He your boy, elf?”

Falon turned around. “He’s my uncle,” he lied. “He’s from Orlais, not the Free Marches – he doesn’t speak the language so well.”

Abelas’s facial expression didn’t change.

“Yeah?” The guard said. “Well then _you_ should damn well know it’s ‘yes sir’ when your better talks to you.”

They wouldn’t speak to the Inquisitor that way, Falon thought bitterly, but he put up a placating hand and said, “Sorry sir, I guess I’ve been out of the Marches too long.”

The guard snickered, and said, “Yeah? How’s an elf like you get to Orlais anyway?”

“Got waylaid after working as a shiphand, sir. That business with the Breach made a real mess of things.”

Falon was a bad liar. He’d been told as much by Bull, Solas, Cassandra, Blackwall, Sera, Dorian, and Vivienne. Maybe because he’d never felt the need to lie before, when it was only him and his clan, when the only person he had to lie to was his own father, and he never wanted to lie to him. But then he found himself surrounded by apparently very accomplished liars, and it came easier and easier.

And this time, it was so easy he needn’t even think about it.

The guard tongued his cheek, clearly disappointed by the banalness of the answer, and waved Abelas and Falon on. “Fine. Go on then.”

“Yes sir,” Falon said. The second his back was turned, he scrunched his nose up night and muttered to Abelas, in low elvish, “ _Those words taste bad.”_

Abelas cracked a smile.

“ _You lied to them._ ”

Falon’s elvish was not strong, but even he understood that much. He shrugged. “ _No harm.”_

“ _No harm_ ,” Abelas agreed. He said something in the ancient language that Falon couldn’t parse, and must have realized that he’d hit the limits of Falon’s capabilities as his ears dipped in irritation and he translated, “You remind me of someone.”

“Who’s that?”

“You wouldn’t know them by name,” Abelas said.  

Falon rolled his eyes. “Come on. Let’s find a place to stay the night, harhen.”

 

The alienage had a smell to it that was almost as foul as he’d expected his clan’s encampment to be. Smelled like sewage and burning things and rotting wood. A little further in was a small facsimile of a market, with vendors selling pastries and salted meats, one vendor selling workman’s tools and another selling carved statues of…

Wolves and halla. Falon approached the stall and turned one over in his hands, certain he’d seen this exact craft before. It took only a second for the vendor to accost him – “It’s two silvers for that, but it’ll bring you good luck as long as it faces away from your—”

The voice was unmistakable to Falon, because he’d heard it whenever he deigned to visit the craftsman for a new bow, or to mend an old one. He looked up and saw a face he did not recognize because it was burned and warped, and the worst of it was hidden under a scarf that circled his face, and his vallas’lin had been burned away with his left eye.

The vendor’s hand flew over his mouth. “Mythal’s tits, is that really you, Falon?”

It had to be Juna. Falon felt the butterflies in his stomach clear as Juna walked around the cart and slung his arms around him tight. “Creators,” Falon replied, squeezing the old carver back. “I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you.”

“What’s left of me,” Juna joked. “I seem to have misplaced some of my face.”

Falon laughed breathlessly.

Juna nodded to Abelas – “Andaran atishan, lethallin. It’s not much of a clan but there’s no need to be a stranger. I’m Juna.”

Abelas awkwardly nodded back, glancing down at Falon. He nodded to Juna – “Andaran atishan. My name is Abelas.”

Juna cocked his head. Falon feared for a moment that Juna would say the name was strange, that it was an odd thing to name a child, and Abelas would respond in kind. But Juna smiled with the half of his face that still moved properly, and stooped down to remove a wooden block from beside the wheel. “Well come on, I’ll fix you something to eat.”

Falon followed without hesitation, only for Abelas to set a hand on his shoulder. Falon was irritated that Abelas would try to keep him from the only survivor of his clan that he’d met so far, and he shrugged him off. “No one’s making you come, Abelas.”

“I just don’t think this is relevant to our purpose—”

“I’m going,” Falon said. “Come or don’t.”

Abelas sighed, muttered something that he probably thought Falon didn’t understand. Falon did understand. He’d been called a stubborn ass in every language he knew, and Solas had so helpfully introduced him to the phrase in elvhen even when his father and Keeper kept their whispers too low to hear. He ignored the complaint and followed Juna.

\--

Juna’s home was a cramped attic stuffed too-full with carved halla and soldiers filling the shelves, little emerald knights riding atop their halla and accompanied by noble-looking white wolves, some fully painted, some not. He apparently slept on a bedroll beside the window, and not a square inch of table was free for cooking. He had a stove of his own, at least, and a few sacks of barley pressed up against the wall.

Abelas had to duck to keep from hitting his head on the ceiling.

“Sorry—it’s a bit tight in here, but we can talk now. So, come on. Tell me everything, and I’ll get some porridge started and brew some tea—”

“I was hoping you could tell _me_ what I missed,” Falon admitted.

Juna shook his head. “I will, da’len, but indulge me, please. These flat-ears have _no_ dramatic flair.”

“Come on now,” Falon said. “Deshanna wouldn’t approve of that.”

“Well Deshanna never had to live with them,” Juna muttered. “Andraste this, Maker that…I tell you. I slip up and call one of the little ones da’len and all of a sudden their parents are shooing them away from me. Can’t sell shit to the residents, they think I’m all strange—ah, listen to me rambling on and on about my frustrations. I’m being a terrible host.”

“No, no. It’s refreshing, actually, after being drowned under all that Andraste stuff,” Falon muttered.

Juna scooped out some barley in a little carved bowl and into his ceramic pot, then set it atop the stove and began to stoke the flames.

“Now _that’s_ what I wanted to hear about. We all got your letters but obviously that ended when…well, you know.”

Falon nodded. “I buried them, you know.”

“Good. Falon’din enaste. I was too scared to make my way back early on, and now I’m worried if I leave the shemlen won’t let me back in. So come on, tell me a good story. You’ve got to have more now, since it’s been so long.”

“Well,” Falon said, “You might like to hear about the dragon I killed.”

Juna’s eyes went wide as Falon’s used to at tales of the Emerald Knights, and he shuffled to a sit across the floor from him. “You killed a damn dragon?”

Falon couldn’t help but grin. “A few, as a matter of fact.”

“Andruil enaste—you must tell us, da’len.”

Even Abelas’s eyes were wide as Falon told them how he and his companions had been set upon by dragons, and how they took them down. He told them about Cassandra’s ferocity, Bull’s excitement, Sera’s wild euphoria, and Varric’s blatant terror and frustration since he’d fought dragons with Hawke as well and was damn tired of extinct things trying to kill him.

He made sure to expound upon the times he and Solas and Cole were knocked clear off their feet and were left near defenseless, surely doomed, until they stood up and saw Blackwall holding his ground against the dragon all on his own, or Dorian and Vivienne throwing up barriers of arcane energy and ice and electricity and fire, whichever would suffice, valiant warriors protecting their fallen comrades.

\--

Abelas was silent through most of the exchange between Falon and his disfigured friend – he couldn’t figure how old this Juna was, but he was at least certain that he must be older than Falon, at least. Falon was new to the world, but Juna seemed to have at least a few centuries—no, new elves didn’t live that long, decades more than Falon did. Abelas found himself looking over the little wooden carvings – they were consistent and, he supposed, charming in a way. Some of them had intricate details worked in with a special tool, so the wolves were textured, the halla had perfect little eyes and hooves and fur.

Falon had explained to him a while back that it was customary to place a stone wolf facing away from the camp, to turn Fen’Harel on intruders, and Juna seemed to interpret this liberally as he placed the wolves all facing the window, or the door, which no doubt emphasized his strangeness to the city elves from the streets below.

He listened in as Falon recounted the tales of waking up in the care of the human woman he referred to as Cassandra, and his friendship with the little elf Sera, and his alchemical studies and his rather frustrating relationship with Solas.

Abelas hadn’t realized how severe it was until he heard Falon tell it.

“It was constant, you know, it wasn’t like with Sera where we could just go shoot or blow something up. Maybe cause Sera’s not so interested in our stories in the first place, you know, so she didn’t ask about them much. But with Solas, it was every little thing, and it just piled on and on until it was too much to ask for him to just talk to me like a person. And he couldn’t treat me like an adult, either. Always had to treat me like a child.”

Abelas held his tongue, that Falon was _so young_ , he was _new_ , and how could anyone know how _new_ he was without thinking of him as a child, a child who hadn’t even finished growing yet, who hadn’t grown into his ears, much less the rest of himself.

“Damn,” Juna said. “Didn’t mention that in your letters—”

“Well it got worse _after_ I punched him.”

Falon had told Abelas as much before, and he’d been unsurprised since he already knew that the boy had a temper. But Juna presumably didn’t know – and didn’t seem to be surprised in the least. That rather confirmed to Abelas that his temper began long before he ever stumbled across the magic in his left hand, that he’d been volatile before, but this should not have surprised him either after what he had seen.

“I’d imagine so. Deshanna wouldn’t have approved of that either – nor your father for that matter,” Juna spoke in a voice that refused to scold, with a level of respect that Abelas realized was likely normal among his clan.

“I know,” Falon said. “I apologized but, well, once you’ve carved something, you’ll never get all the wood back.”

“Da’len, you should have told us how bad it was.”

“Maybe,” Falon muttered. “I didn’t want anyone to worry. I figured I’d make it back and I’d never have to see them again after we closed the Breach. Maybe I should have let them worry. Maybe then you’d have all come, and they’d still be alive.”

“Falon,” Juna said, “You know your father worried every day you were away, you know he prayed you’d be safe. He wouldn’t want you blaming yourself.”

Falon hugged his knees close to his chest while Juna turned away from his cooking.

 “We all worried. He just wanted you safe, and you were safer as Andraste’s Herald than as a hunter of Clan Lavellan. That’s how I understood it, anyway. I just know that if you’d told him what you just told me, he’d—”

“Well I didn’t. He didn’t.”

Abelas didn’t quite understand the attachment to his father over the others, but he recognized the impulse to hide vulnerabilities in a strange land, surrounded by strange people, and he knew by now that Falon was practiced in maintaining his façade, when he wanted to, or needed to, though his mask was forged in anger.

“I’m not blaming you, Falon. And you shouldn’t either.”

“Well you should,” Falon muttered. “It was my fault.”

Juna picked up Falon’s bowl and served him another scoop of grain, clucking his tongue and muttering to himself the whole way. “Well, I know arguing with you won’t do any good. I’ve seen our Keeper and First try before. For someone as smart as you, I’d think you’d at least recognize when you’re wrong, but you’re more stubborn than clever.”

Abelas barely restrained a laugh as he spooned another bite of barley into his mouth. That was a fair summation of Falon.

Falon rolled his eyes as Juna handed him another bowl.

“Come on. Eat up – I figured at least the shemlen would at least get some meat on those bones…”

“The entire clan fell on _my_ watch, Juna, I should have _been­­_ —”

Juna yanked Falon’s ear to silence him, which warranted a sharp yelp. Abelas’s own ears dipped low reflexively. Juna’s good ear was back with irritation, and the one hidden under the scarf dragged the fabric low enough that Abelas could see the burns that raked through his scalp.

“Damn it, Juna,” Falon snapped, massaging his ear, “You can’t just do that—”

“Yeah? My roof, my rules. Your babae’s not here to do it, and your friend’s too polite. Pity yourself somewhere else. Now eat your supper, before I twang your ear again.”

\---

They spent the night sleeping on the floor of Juna’s cramped apartment, surrounded by halla and emerald knights and tiny wolves all perched with their noses out the window. Falon slept a few scant hours before waking, at least without any serious nightmares like he’d had before. He laid awake for a few minutes before deciding he wouldn’t get back to sleep anytime soon, and slipped out down the stairs, keeping close to the wall to keep the floorboards from squeaking.

Falon tied a strip of cloth over his forehead. If Juna was to be trusted, the Dalish were treated with suspicion even by their city-born cousins. And Falon did trust him, he found it hard not to trust the man who’d taught him to lace his boots and string his bows and which plants were safe to eat and which to lay over a wound to deter infection, not to mention countless songs and verses. It dampened his spirits to see him so impoverished, but at least now that he knew he was alive he could send him money, or invite him to Skyhold.

Falon had few opportunities to explore the cities he’d been to alone at night, and he knew he shouldn’t have been so shocked by the number of drunken people stumbling around, the men perfumed in the sweet, musky scent of smoke as they shared a pipe, the servants and stablehands returning from long days exhausted and weary, groups of girls no older than Falon walking each other home. It was a different sort of bustle at night, a bit more hectic, and he didn’t know any of these people. He didn’t feel at liberty to introduce himself, he was too young to visit with the old men smoking their pipe, too strange to approach the girls, and too wild to pass for a stablehand or servant. He’d never had need of shyness among his own people, but these were not his people, and the only person he knew among them was a pariah.

He sighed, and figured a more worthwhile prowl might be outside the alienage walls. He remembered what the guard had told him, but decided not to listen. He kept a small blade concealed in his boot, just in case, though his bow and daggers remained with his hart.

The rest of the city was a little less lively at night, which suited Falon since he wasn’t meant to be there, not as the waylaid shiphand visiting with his Orlesian uncle. As the Inquisitor, it might be another story. The rules didn’t apply so much once he’d been labelled as Andraste’s Herald, and no matter how he protested the label stuck. He wasn’t an elf, after all, he was the Herald, the Maker’s chosen.

Funny how people could tell themselves that after seeing him in the flesh.

He kept to back allies and watched with some interest as people came and went from taverns, one a kitchen worker with a white scarf tied around her head, barely concealing her ears. It wasn’t, Falon assumed, to keep her from being pegged as an elf, but to keep the few dark hairs from dipping into people’s drinks. She swore to herself and started walking back towards the Alienage, and Falon realized she must have gotten off work too late.

He wondered if it’d even come off as well-intentioned if he approached and offered to walk back with her, but he didn’t have to wonder long as a human emerged from another shop and she walked right into him. He swore at her, and she covered her face with her hand and muttered a, “Sorry sir, just need to hurry home—”

Falon darted across the street just in time for the man to snap about “what we do to rabbits out after dark.”

He inserted himself between the man and the elven girl and flashed a grin as he said, “Well it’s hard to get home with a big lug like you in the way, sir.”

The man reeled back to punch him, no doubt startled by the intrusion, and Falon leaned back and let him stumble awkwardly past.

They were making a scene, he could hear window shutters creaking open and doors cracking, and a few tavern goers were poking their heads out to get a look. Falon left his hands in his pockets as the human scrambled back to his feet, red-faced and just as aware of the onlookers as the rest of them.

Falon glanced to the kitchenhand, who shook her head furiously and mouthed, “ _Don’t_ ,” at him.

Just as the man stood up and snapped, “Hold still you little shit—”

Falon knew this man was untrained, and couldn’t land a hit on him without a substantial supply of luck. He dodged another punch and offered a wry grin, glad to see the human getting red-faced and pissed without him needing to raise a finger.

The girl, however, was nowhere near so pleased. She grabbed his arm and pulled him towards the alienage. Falon initially resisted and planted himself, but she snapped, “Andraste’s knickers, you idiot, what are you waiting for?!” and he realized she was trying to rescue _him_ now.

The girl started running, one hand on Falon’s arm and the other holding her skirt as she sprinted back for the alienage, and Falon kept running along after her, peeking back to see if they were being followed. They were, so he pointed to an alley, tapped the girl on the arm, and said, “That way, he can’t fit through there—”

She shook her head – “This way’s faster—” and led him through a wider alley that led right up to a wall. Falon was about to square up for a fight when she laid her hands on a wooden plank and pulled aside it and a wider patchwork of colorful woods, a heavy, hidden door disguised as graffiti, revealing a path right to the Alienage. “Come on then.”

Part of Falon wanted to fight, but he slipped through, and her after him, and they slid the panel back into place.

The girl pulled her scarf down and shook her head. “Ugh. Piece of work, that one. And you – you’re stupid. He’d have killed you, you know. Probably snap you like a toothpick.”

Falon cocked his head, dumbfounded, because he hadn’t been around anyone who didn’t take it for granted that he could at least hold his own in a fight against trained soldiers and darkspawn and whatever else came at him. He’d fought actual dragons. He’d fought a damn archdemon!

“Do you normally work this late, Headband? I haven’t seen you around.”

Falon shook his head – “I’m actually new here.”

“Yeah? Well I’m Melwyn. I do some cooking in the tavern and my asshole boss made me stay past curfew just ‘cause he said he was too busy to lose the extra hands. Does it at least once a week.”

As she spoke, Melwyn unraveled her scarf and set to work unpinning her bun so her hair could fly free over her shoulders, thick curls that had barely been contained before. She ran her fingers through her hair to break some of the crimps and mats that had formed during the day, but gave up when her fingers couldn’t make it all the way through without a hard tug.

“You got a name, Headband?”

“Falon.”

“Well, Falon. Are you hungry? My boss is an asshole, but he pays decent.”

Falon didn’t really have a taste for more barley, but he knew he wasn’t getting any sleep tonight and Melwyn seemed about as much of a riot as Sera. “I can eat.”

“Good – let’s go.”

So he followed Melwyn through the alienage to another tavern, this one smaller and more run down, but livelier and more colorful as well. He recognized some of the songs people sang, including one elderly drunken elf who was rattling off his version of “Sera was Never.”

Damn. Sera would hate this place. He followed Melwyn to the bar, where she slid up on a stool and slapped the counter a few times. She seemed irritated that the stool next to her was still empty and spun around.

“Well come on, Headband, you’re hungry, right?”

Falon slid onto the stool next to her, and she stared long and hard at him. “What’s that on your face?”

“What?”

Melwyn reached over and poked Falon’s nose. “No. This stuff. It’s under the headband too, isn’t it?”

Falon untied the headband and laid it on the counter. Melwyn squinted and looked at it, and asked, “Is that a tree? Why’d you tattoo a tree on your face? That’s a bit weird.”

Falon took too long to answer, and Melwyn got distracted by the bartender sliding a big, puffy pastry in front of each of them, slicing it open to reveal steaming fluffy potatoes dotted with spice, and proceeding to dump some gravy on top. Melwyn slid him a silver, and he pocketed it. Falon moved to do the same and Melwyn said, “I just paid yours. Maker…You really are new, aren’t you?”

Falon nodded – “That I am. So, what’s worth drinking around here?”

\---

Once the headband came off, a few of the older elves started giving Falon strange looks, but few of them seemed to make the connection that the tree on his face represented Dalish customs. Maybe because he dressed in commoner’s clothes and spoke at least _mostly_ like a commoner, they didn’t know the difference between Dalish and country bumpkin. Or, as Melwyn called him, a hayseed.

He’d spent so much time keeping the Creator’s names out of his mouth, except when swearing or singing, that it was easy to keep them out for the conversation he had with Melwyn. And he didn’t feel much need to talk about himself, except for answering a few of Melwyn’s questions when she asked them.

“So where are you from?”

“Ah, well, the Marches, originally, but I’ve been all over Ferelden and Orlais this past year, and never stayed in one place too long before. Me and my folks travelled a lot.”

He wondered what he would have to say for Melwyn to really pick up on the fact that he was Dalish, but she seemed to fill in the blanks for herself, and they only led to, “Right – you’re a shiphand. Duh.”

He was a little more accepted when he deigned to join in on singing a few tavern songs, and Melwyn cackled and clapped along to the tale of Sir Nuggins. Once they’d both had a couple of beers and eaten their fill, Melwyn led him back through the kitchen and introduced him to another elf with dark skin and dark eyes and blue-gray curls wrapped up in a red bandana. He caught one look at Falon and seemed surprised, but Melwyn spoke before he could.

“Falon, this is my dad. He’s the cook here. Dad, this is Falon. He’s new here.”

Melwyn’s dad looked unsurprised by the revelation that Falon was new, and Falon got the distinct impression that he already knew why.

“Any reason you’re bringing him back here with his hair uncovered? Why _your_ hair’s uncovered?”

“Dad,” Melwyn groaned.

“Come on, get that hair up and then we’ll talk,” he scolded. “You know better, Mel.”

So they both tied back their hair, Falon covering it with the same scarf he’d used to cover his vallaslin, and Melwyn rewrapping her hair in her white headwrap. Her father seemed satisfied by this, and continued chopping vegetables as they talked. Falon felt an impulse to grab a knife and start peeling turnips along with him, but Melwyn pulled out a stool and told him to sit, then pulled out another for herself and perched on top.

“So what’s going on that you’re picking up stragglers, Melwyn?”

“Found him on my way home from work, Dad. He was gonna get his arse kicked.”

“I was _not,_ ” Falon said. “That guy couldn’t hit me if I walked into his fist.”

“Yeah, but it’s not him you want to worry about, it’s his friends,” Melwyn said. “So I dragged him back here. Figured we’d eat, which we did, and I’d show him off to you. He has a whole tree on his face, isn’t that a little funny?”

Melwyn’s father paused his work to look over Falon, and he raised a brow knowingly. “Well, Falon, what brings you here? Hopefully not to pick fights and start trouble.”

Falon had, in fact, come exclusively to pick fights. Just not with individual commoners like the one he’d seen bothering Melwyn. He’d come to kill the Duke, which was not going to be an acceptable answer. “Oh, I had a bit of business I’d neglected while I was working in Orlais. So I came to take care of a few things, deal with a few dead relatives, you know. Stuff like that. I’m not exactly here for fun.”

Melwyn and her father both grew solemn. “I can understand that,” he said as he returned to his vegetables. “You must have heard about the plague, then. It took my wife from me, and too many of our friends.”

This was new to Falon, but he listened with a straight face all the same, and let Melwyn continue.

“It was bad, Falon. They locked us all up in here and left us to die. We have a few people who know old tricks to deal with ills, but they’re for stomachaches and chills, you know? No one here knew what to do, and without any real medicine…”

“Damn,” Falon said. “Worse than I’d even heard.”

“I’m not surprised,” Melwyn’s father replied. “Word travels far, but bad news from the Alienage tends to dilute when humans are the ones to tell it.”

Melwyn nodded. “Most of us got sick, Dad and me too, but my mom never got better. A lot of people didn’t.”

“Ah.”

“That Juna didn’t, though,” Melwyn’s father muttered. “Lots of people spread bad rumors about him, said he’s a wild elf and brought some sorcery with him. People get stupid when they’re scared, and took it out on him. But the humans got sick too, you know, and nowhere near as badly.”

That was more for Falon’s benefit than for Melwyn’s. Falon's brain raced as he thought through the reasons that could be - if perhaps Juna had been sick before and gained some immunity, if he'd eaten a certain food that others didn't, or refused a food that others ate, but he was interrupted by Melwyn's beleagured huff. 

“Melwyn told me your name, but not mine,” her father said, changing the subject. “I’m Adris.”

“Falon,” he said reflexively.

Melwyn shoved him. “I told him that, Headband.”

“So,” Adris said. “How are you with a knife?”

Falon was just drunk enough that he almost answered he could cut up a Red Templar in the span of three heartbeats, but then he remembered they were in a _kitchen_ and not an armory, and said instead, “Not too bad. I can break down a bird in under a minute.”

“Good – cut these into cubes for me then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tfw you go to avenge your clan but end up getting a job as a prep cook instead


	8. Kin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Abelas has more fun than he should be having. So does Falon.

It was still early when Abelas woke to the sounds of Juna striking his head on his own shelves, knocking dozens of carved soldiers onto the ground. He swore a few words that were new to Abelas, and began gathering them under his arm. “Ir abelas, little ones…ahhhh…and you’ve gotten stuck under there now haven’t you?”

Abelas knew he was not getting any more sleep, and sat upright, using magic to call the fallen soldier out from behind the shelving and into his palm. It was like a child’s toy more than anything, and perhaps that was all it was meant to be. Juna nodded appreciatively and began laying out his soldiers on the shelf where they had been.

There was at least a little more space than the night before—

Because Falon had gone missing.

“Did you hear Falon leave?” Abelas said sharply.

Juna shook his head. “Can’t say that I did…”

Abelas swore to himself, and hurried out the door. Juna followed shortly after, placing a hand on Abelas’s shoulder and saying, “He left his things, lethallin, he’ll be back when it suits him.”

Abelas wanted to turn on his heel and tell this strange, malformed elf that they were _not_ blood, but it was unnecessary, even cruel, and he knew that Juna was the closest thing to blood that Falon had left, and had seen how relaxed he became in Juna’s tiny home. He sighed, and turned around. “He doesn’t know this place.”

Juna laughed. “And what better way for a young man to get to know a new place than to wait for all the old codgers to doze off and go hunting? Once they get their vallas’lin, they know everything. Didn’t you know that?”

Abelas couldn’t help but crack a smile at that, and he allowed Juna to lead him back upstairs for a breakfast of barley-based porridge, and Falon stumbled in later that morning just a tad inebriated, and inordinately pleased with himself. He took a seat on the floor and refused breakfast, insisting to Juna, “I ate already, if I eat any more I’m going to burst.”

“No? Well I made too much then. _Someone_ has to eat it.”

Abelas volunteered by offering his own bowl, and Juna refilled it as he continued, “So what trickery did you get up to last night?”

“No tricks,” Falon yawned. “I walked around a bit, got a feel for the place, had dinner and drinks with a new friend and now I think I’m ready to sleep.”

“At least you’re not _too_ drunk,” Juna snorted. “Go on and rest then. I’ve got to set up my stall.”

\---

Falon woke again around noon, more rested than he’d been in a long while. Exhaustion had a way of warding off nightmares that no potion could fully replicate. He picked up his knapsack, remembering that he’d agreed to walk Melwyn to work in the afternoon. He’d been surprised how few elves even recognized the markings on his face as Dalish, but he supposed the only other Dalish elf they’d met so far was Juna, whose markings had been freshly burned away.

He met Abelas and Juna out by the stall. Juna offered his wares to interested children, and was in the process of spinning tales about Emerald Knights and their hounds and halla while they gaped wide-eyed at him. Abelas sat on a stool, whittling at his own block, and stopped and set it down when he saw Falon approach.

“There you are.”

Falon had half a mind to tease him for worrying, but instead he cracked his neck and said, “I offered to walk my friend to work in the market.”

“I’ll come with.”

“Oh, I can’t steal you away from your carving…it’s such a lovely…block with a chip taken out of it.”

Juna paused from his story to snap, “And your carvings have improved, have they? Should I put you to work then?”

Falon laughed as he waved to Juna and began his walk towards the gate, where Melwyn was already waiting for him along with a few others preparing to leave. She gawked at Abelas, who towered over every other elf in the Alienage, and said, “Hoo boy they make them tall in Orlais, don’t they?”

Abelas looked puzzled.

“Maker, it took me forever to think of this. You’re Dalish. Both of you, right?” She asked. Falon didn’t have a chance to answer before she repeated, “The only Dalish I’ve ever met is Juna, you know, and he doesn’t have those thingies. The things the Chantry says about you folk are wild. Juna, I think he’s just a bit weird, but you, you’re alright by me. Come on – we’re about to get walking. Safer in a group, you know?”

“Much appreciated,” Abelas said before Falon could parse all she said. “I’m Abelas.”

“Nice to meet you. Well you can’t be related to him – he’s way too short for that.”

“This is Melwyn,” Falon said. “And no, Abelas is just a friend.”

“Too bad for you. You might have come out taller,” Melwyn teased.

The rest of the group was vaguely familiar to Falon, since he’d seen a few of them in the streets and a few in the tavern. Mostly workers, out to clean the houses of the obscenely wealthy or work in their kitchens. Melwyn worked closest to the Alienage of all of them, and that was why her boss felt comfortable keeping her past curfew so often.

“He thinks because I have a shorter walk that it’s not such a big deal, you know, and it’s impossible to make enough money just working out of the alienage,” she explained. “We used to have my mom’s work bringing in money, but, well, then the plague happened and now we don’t.”

Abelas looked particularly confused by this. If the Dalish confused him, at least they resembled him in some fashion. The city folk didn’t even attempt such imitations.

“Well, this is where we part from the group,” she said. She waved to her walking companions and led Falon by the hand towards the tavern. “You’re too new to have a job yet, so I figured I’d set you up in the kitchens with me.”

“Oh – I actually—”

“Oh, you actually what? You actually have a job? Pray tell, what is it then, Falon?”

Abelas brought a fist to his mouth to stifle a chuckle as Falon stammered, “Well, I mean, I do but it’s hard to explain.”

Melwyn raised an incredulous brow. “Oh, you mean to make a living cutting purse strings?”

Falon very quickly quacked, “No!”

Melwyn laughed. “Then come on, what’s your job. You can tell me.”

Falon wondered what she would even say if he told her the truth, that he was the Inquisitor and had no real need for a job. Instead, he muttered, “Well, Juna can hire me on to do some carvings and mind the stall—”

“Yeah, if you want to go hungry maybe. Come on. At least working in the kitchen you get some food before the day’s done.”

Falon had little to say to argue. Before he could so much as attempt a counter, Abelas clapped a hand on his shoulder and with an uncharacteristic humor whispered, “Go – it will be a learning opportunity for you.”

Falon glared at Abelas. “You’re enjoying this too much.”

Abelas shrugged, still smiling slyly, and waved to him as Melwyn led him away.  

\---

Melwyn’s introduction to her boss, and the kitchen, was at least a little bolder than her introduction to the patrons. But for the time being, she told him that Falon was just a hayseed who was good with a knife and could, using his own words, “Break down a bird in a minute.”

Her boss, Kato, a short, bald man with a permanently red nose nodded impatiently and said, “Sure. I’ll pay you three silvers a day to start.”

A small wage, but fair enough. Enough to live on, at least, if he had to. He was tempted to remind Melwyn that he didn’t actually want a job, but he just didn’t have it in him, so he said, “Sounds fair.”

Melwyn shot him an odd look, and he remembered that he was supposed to call him _sir._

“Sir.”

“Like I said. Bit of a hayseed, this one, but he’s good.”

Kato shrugged, and said, “Well get started then, and for fuck’s sake, keep your hair covered. If anyone finds a hair in their stew, you’re out.”

Simple enough.

Falon shrugged, and began chopping up the vegetables. He wasn’t near as fast as Melwyn, at least not at first. He hadn’t, after all, had to cook for this volume of people. He found himself getting more invested than he’d intended, wanting to fly through those turnips like Melwyn did. In the time it took him to do one, she’d finished one and gotten halfway through the second.

Kato interrupted them a few hours in and told them to eat now, “Cause you won’t have time once that dinner rush hits.”

Melwyn poured herself a cup of stew from the pot, and one for Falon as well, and led him outside, where they sat on barrels to eat. It was still light out, but it would be dark in two hours, Falon was certain. He felt that curfew was particularly heinous in this light.

“You usually eat outside?” he asked.

“Boss doesn’t let elves eat in the tavern,” Melwyn said casually.

But it’s fine to employ them, Falon thought bitterly. “How’s anyone supposed to make it in this damned place?”

“You’re not,” Melwyn said with a shrug. “That’s just what it is. It’s not all bad. We're all family here, you know? The humans, they barely even know each other. But we look out for one another, for the most part. And I'll look after you.”

Now that, Falon understood. Still, it seemed fragile, dangerous to live so near to humans like this, when they were actively hostile.

“As far as bosses go, he’s not too bad,” Melwyn said. “A break, dinner, and three silvers a day ain’t too bad for us.”

No, it wasn’t, and that was precisely what irritated Falon. At least in his clan, it hadn’t been constant subjugation. He’d never had to bow his head low and call every human _sir_ or _ma’am_ no matter how undeserving. “It’s not like this everywhere,” he said.

“Yeah, but not all of us can just run off to the woods, you know? Otherwise, why would you be here?”

“Ouch,” Falon said.

She might as well have punched him in the stomach.

They sat and ate their stew and watched the people walking by, and Melwyn took the opportunity to take off her scarf. “You’re planning on staying, right?”

He wasn’t. But before he could answer he saw the man from before, the same one he’d seen blocking Melwyn’s path. Melwyn saw him too, because she dumped the last dregs of her stew on the ground for the dogs and told Falon to do the same. “Come on. You shouldn’t have picked a fight with him. He’s a real prick.”

Falon hadn’t so much picked a fight as intervened in what he thought would be one, but Melwyn was worried, and any normal elf would be too. He dumped his stew, and let her pull him inside.

\---

They worked about another hour before Melwyn couldn’t avoid going out to bus some dishes while Kato tended the bar, and Falon could hear the man from the kitchen barking out orders, and he heard a loud crash and shattering of glass.

He left the kitchen just in time to hear, “Fuck, Rabbit, guess you’re gonna be late again.”

He did it on purpose. Falon walked out and said, “I’ll get it, Melwyn.”

The man recognized him by voice, and the moment Falon leaned down to pick up the largest shards he caught the man standing in the corner of his eyes, and he did not even bother to disguise his disgust. Melwyn shook her head, and backed towards the kitchen.

“Falon,” she whispered. “Don’t.”

Falon could practically feel the man reaching for him, and he stepped out of the way fluidly. The tavern was packed, there wasn’t much room to move, it was shit circumstances for a fight in most capacities, but fine by Falon, since this man reeked of alcohol.

“Woah there,” he said, “You’re too deep in your cups.”

Ah. Right. He was forgetting, “Sir.”

The man stepped over the broken glass, and Falon could hear Melwyn whispering for him to _“Run, I’ll cover for you—”_

But Falon wasn’t about to run from this man. He’d just turn back on Melwyn, like he’d been doing.

“Could you move, sir?” he said, smiling as serenely as he could manage. The way a dog ‘smiled’ as it lunged on the end of a chain, before the bight. “Wouldn’t want you to get cut.”

“Did you hear that? This one threatened to cut me.”

Kato muttered, “ _Not this again,”_ and said, “Alright, boy, get back to the kitchen. Melwyn’ll deal with the glass.”

“He said I’d get cut.”

Falon could practically hear Kato’s voice shouting _on the glass you idiot._

“You gonna let this knife-ear talk to me like that?”

The bar was quiet as a few men turned to face him. Falon did not conceal his disgust at the man, and he said, “Yes. He is. Because everyone in here thinks you’re a rotten ass who smells like wine-drenched shit.”

A sputter of laughter came from across the tavern, as well as some nervous shifting. Kato and Melwyn were both muttering for him to _stop it before it gets any worse_ and it was too late, because the man had thrown a punch and Falon leaned out of the way, let him stumble into a table and get a bellyful of another patron’s hot stew.

“Shit, sir, you ought to sit down,” he mocked. “You might hurt yourself.”

He talked to Melwyn like that because he thought he’d get away with it. Well let him try with Falon. Let him see what happened.

He saw a few men whispering to each other in the corner before a few ran out to the street.

The man threw another punch, and another, and Falon dodged the second and third even more easily than the first as his attacker grew redder and more flustered.

And then something struck Falon in the small of his back, and he realized another patron had sided with the man and kicked him. Falon buckled briefly, but he slipped out of the way just in time for his first attacker to stumble right into his second. They toppled over in the chair, and the broken glass was ever the hazard.

 _Someone_ screamed, and _someone’s_ blood was on the floor.

“I tried to warn you,” Falon said.

“Oh Andraste’s tits,” Kato muttered. “That’s it, get out, get him out of here, get them both out of here!”

It shouldn’t have been surprising when the men who’d scurried out returned with guards.

The guards always came quickly when there was even the slightest mention of an elf causing trouble with a human, and this was no exception. Dozens of guards appeared, some invested in stopping the fights, others waiting hungrily to see the consequences. There’d be a hanging, for certain. That was the way of things in Wycome, and in the rest of the civilized world.

But Falon knew, as he stood beside the exhausted humans, that there was an easier way to stop this, and a way to stop the guard from harassing Melwyn as well. He did not drop his weapon as he was commanded, but instead raised his left hand to the air and allowed the anchor to flash a bright, wild green.

Men who had jeered and glared at him took a knee. They all knew, even out here, who he was.

“The Herald of Andraste!”

“Falon Lavellan, of the Inquisition,” he corrected, sheathing his weapon. “I came here to settle a few matters regarding my people, but it seems there’s little I can do from the ground.”

One guard emerged from the others, and Falon could spot a few motioning to each other and whispering before scuttling off towards the keep. He couldn’t even see Melwyn anymore. Maybe she’d already gotten away.

“Inquisitor,” one said, “My deepest apologies. Can we arrange an audience at your earliest convenience?”

Falon did not miss people speaking to him like an elf, but neither did he miss people speaking to him like a lordling. He huffed out his nose and said, “Of course. If you don’t mind, I’ll need to collect an ally from the alienage.”

“We’ll send for them immediately—”

“Send an elven messenger, if you don’t mind. Don’t want to cause a scene.”

“Yes, sir.”

Falon allowed the guard to lead him towards the keep, his gut wrenching as he wondered what would happen to Melwyn – particularly if he did what he’d wanted to do.

\---

Abelas entered the room with his hood up, and a simple wooden staff on his person. Probably courtesy of Juna. He wondered who Juna expected to sell those to, exactly, or if he did expect to sell them at all. The chamber they waited in was furnished more simply than those Falon found himself in when he took audiences with Orlesian bureaucrats and chantry folk, save for the walls, which he couldn’t see under the mounted animals and pelts and paintings of battles and nature.

They were given a bottle of wine and told it would be at least half an hour before the Duke was prepared to join them. Falon hadn’t expected to be given such easy access to the Duke. It would be simple as skinning a hare to kill him, in that light, but his gut wrenched as he thought of Melwyn, and the alienage, and the tavern full of excited elves singing Sera’s name even as they had no idea what she thought about that stupid song, or about elfy elves.

Other than that, it seemed they were alone. Falon had no interest in the wine, and Abelas saw that he wasn’t drinking and abstained himself.

Abelas asked, calmly, “Is there something wrong? Is this not what you came for?”

“It is,” Falon said quietly, “But then…”

Abelas was quiet, and why shouldn’t he be? He didn’t know anything about the world he currently inhabited, except for what they’d already spoken of. He didn’t know what city elves faced any more than Falon had – less, even, because Falon had heard stories that rang true.

It also made his heart sink that no matter what happened he’d never be able to fit in with the city elves either. He was outspoken in a way that got his city-born cousins killed if they try. Even Melwyn, who was bold and brash as Sera within the alienage was meek and quiet as a rabbit for even the most vile of humans. And Falon had never learned that. He learned to be cautious, sure, but to him cautious meant avoidance. To Melwyn, it meant wearing a mask.

He’d never been good at masking.

“What is it you hope to gain, then?” Abelas asked.

Falon clenched his fists. He hadn’t thought about gaining anything – he’d gotten some trite apology and a paltry sum of gold for the slaughter of his clan. What would asking reparations in person do? He could demand all of their valuables returned, but what _he_ considered valuable and what the shemlen did were vastly different things. And if he killed the Duke, that would just bring angry humans down on the alienage because they were the only elves within reach. And further—

Abelas placed a hand on Falon’s shoulder.

“Are you alright?”

“Not really, no.”

Abelas regarded him for a moment, and then said, “You do not have to complete this mission.”

Falon knew the moment Abelas said it that this was not an option either. He’d seen what was done to his clan, buried the dead, counted the bodies, done all he could to identify them in their state of decay and rot.

“I want justice,” Falon growled.

But there was no justice in this world. Not for elves.

Abelas let his hand rest on the back of the chair, instead of on Falon’s shoulder. “Then take it.”

“If I do, what do you think will happen to Juna, and Melwyn?”

Abelas looked less understanding than Falon had hoped he would. He seemed more confused, and frustrated with Falon than anything, as his Vallas’lin twisted at the bridge of his scrunched nose and he instead posited, “So then there is nothing to be gained from this.”

“Seems that way,” Falon muttered.

He’d sort of hoped that Abelas at least felt _something_ for the people in the alienage, but he supposed a day wasn’t enough to warrant that sort of kinship. At least, not for him. He’d never lived under Shemlen thumbs before.

And maybe he wouldn’t ever have to, and maybe they wouldn’t have to anymore. Falon took a deep breath, removed a small leather journal from his pack that had gone untouched since the last time he’d crossed through Skyhold’s gates, and he began to flip through the pages, pleased enough to see Sera’s graffiti dotting the corners of every page. If he flipped through fast enough, he could see a little elf shooting an arrow into a dragon’s mouth, just before it belched fire and conveniently exploded.

“Your work?” Abelas asked.

“Sera’s,” Falon corrected.

His own drawings were mostly technical drawings of plants and rock formations, landmarks, interspersed with notes on runes he spotted on walls, lines of elvish text he copied down to translate better later. But he picked a blank page and began to sketch a rough drawing of Melwyn from memory, dark curly hair just waiting to be freed from under a white scarf. If he’d had some colors to work with, her eyes would have been amber, and her skin would have been a sun-starved brown, from working too many late nights and sleeping during the day.

He also wrote a note to himself to invite her to Skyhold, so she and he and Sera could start a new reign of terror. If Sera could get over the elfy bits, that was. But she’d done it before, and could do it again if she had to. And she’d want to. Melwyn was completely her type.


	9. Recompense

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The journey ends.

When the Duke was finally ready for him, Falon brought all of his things, his dagger, his journal, and his cloak. He saw the man was a short, balding human with a big round belly who walked using a cane, and he wanted to curse the Creators for making his mark so damn defenseless.

“Inquisitor – it’s a pleasure to meet you. What brings you here, in person? I received no word of your visit—”

“Before you say another word,” Falon said coldly, “I want you to remind me of the name of the Dalish clan out to the west you had killed.”

The duke paused. “With all respect, I did not have anyone killed—”

“Stop,” Falon interrupted. “If you are going to lie to me, at least _attempt_ to conceal it.”

The duke paused, and rather quickly his demeanor changed. “Guard—”

Falon shot a warning look to the guards, who hesitated. He made no move to grab his weapon. He wasn’t armored, he had none of his draughts or potions which he normally used against his foes. He wouldn’t need them. Not this time.

Besides. One flick of his finger and he could warp the veil so all of them would be left writhing on the ground uselessly, leaving him free to do whatever needed doing. Or, well, they thought as much. Rumors about him were endlessly creative in a way that Falon simply wasn’t.

“Have you come to kill me?”

“I come for justice,” Falon said. “You had my clan slaughtered, left their bodies to rot in the sun, and stole jewelry and crafts and priceless personal affects. And for the trouble of murdering and robbing my people you repaid me with this.”

Falon reached into his breastpocket and produced a wallet, which he opened, letting the two hunded sovereigns inside clatter on the floor. The Duke was as pale as a ghost, and trembling like a child.

“I have come for recompense,” Falon replied. “And your life is worth less than even this paltry sum. So tell me how you have worked to right this wrong.”

“I—” the Duke stammered. Falon already knew the answer from his silence. He had done nothing. Predictably, the man threw himself on his knees and bowed low, which made Falon even more irate, as if his apologies meant anything to him. “Please! Don’t kill me!”

Falon scowled. He ignored the plea. “What laws are in place regarding elves who leave the alienage after curfew?”

“I—they’re old laws, Inquisitor, they’re there for their own protection—”

“That is not what I asked.”

“Just a few nights in jail.”

“And for humans who do the same?”

“Humans…have no curfew.”

“Interesting. And I’m sure you’ve done much for the elves of the alienage during the plague, or…”

“We…restricted them to the alienage. So it wouldn’t spread.”

“Ah. And you had healers working in there?” He paused. “Well-supplied healers?”

“There were…other priorities.”

“Fascinating,” Falon said. “How there are always other priorities. How my clan is worth two hundred sovereigns to you, which doesn’t even begin to cover the cost of what you stole from them. My keeper’s ring, for example, was severed from her hand along with her finger. Firstly, my people believe that you enter the Great Beyond, our afterlife, as you were – so you have maimed at old woman in her afterlife. The ring itself was priceless, you see, literally hundreds of years old, carved during the Dales’ years of independence by craftsmen who never needed fear for their lives. _You_ don’t interest me, your grace. Killing you would bring no more justice to my people than killing a spider would. So I come before you to offer an alternative.”

“Of-of course, whatever you wish—”

“Get off the damn floor,” Falon snapped. “Fen’harel’s teeth, get a scribe in here, I want our agreement taken down.”

So they sat, and talked. Falon’s demands were mostly simple. The curfew would go. Punishments for those humans who spent their time harassing elves need be equal to that of harassing other humans. The elves would receive their own representation among the nobility, and the land where Falon’s clan was murdered would be named to an estate of Clan Lavellan, and any surviving members, or their descendents, need be invited to lay their claims. Further each family who lost a member to the plague of the year previous need be offered reparations of their own, at _minimum_ equivalent to the amount required to travel to Skyhold, where Falon would be certain a home for them was ready, but more frequently enough to purchase a small parcel of land, half an acre, enough to sustain themselves on their own crops in land less squalid.

It was well into the night by the time Falon was finished, and he demanded a copy of the proceedings be forwarded to Josephine, and with the work done he would be returning at his own convenience.

He was rather unsurprised to find Charter when he returned to the alienage, her arms crossed and her lips puckered into a tight facsimile of a smile. “Inquisitor.”

“Has Lelianna had you tailing me this entire time?”

“In case someone tries to kill you, sure. Or, in this case…”

“I didn’t kill anyone, Charter, you can calm down.”

Charter nodded curtly. She offered a similar nod to Abelas, who awkwardly smiled and nodded in reply.

“I figured there wouldn’t be a good way for me to stop you if you were going to, so I settled for taking care of your girlfriend instead.”

Falon blinked. He had absolutely no idea who she was talking about.

“No?” Charter rolled her eyes. “Bugger, Mel, he’s not into girls, I told you so.”

Melwyn emerged from around a corner, her hair back and her hands stuffed into the pockets of her apron, shrugging her shoulders. “Well that’s disappointing. Don’t even think my friends will believe me if I tell them we had a thing, now that you're Ser Herald and not just some hayseed.”

Falon glanced at Abelas, who had begun to laugh.

Falon realized he had spent too much time with Sera, who had as little interest in men as he had in women.

“Well, Inquisitor? Shall I arrange for your return, or do you want to apologize for Mel for being clueless?”

“Melwyn,” Falon said, “You’re welcome to come back to Skyhold anytime. There’s work for you there, in the Inquisition, if you want it. And if your boss is an asshole there, I’ll kill him.”

Melwyn cackled loudly. “You’re a riot. But I got my friends here, and my dad to take care of, and from how Charter puts it, it sounds like your people are coming here any day now. But you’re welcome to visit, or write, or come back and work kitchen with me.”

Falon sighed. “Alright. Sorry for being clueless.”

“Same,” Mel sighed. “I got my hopes up for a minute there. But hey, visit whenever. It’s worth it just to see the humies sweat.”

Falon couldn’t help but smile as Mel waved and returned to her home, and Charter clapped him on the shoulder. “Alright, Inquisitor. Ready to go home?”

Home. He’d thought for so long that he didn’t have a home to go back to, but damn if he didn’t miss Sera and Cassandra and Bull and Cole and everyone else. He even missed Solas. But he wasn’t ready, and he knew the Inquisition wasn’t like his clan – it was going to fall apart not by fire but by time, and he realized in the pit of his stomach that he wasn’t done yet.

“Charter, I think I need to make my own way back.”

“Sister Nightingale won’t be pleased with that,” Charter said. “But I’ll take the heat. Just make sure that whatever you want to get done gets done, and don’t you _dare_ get yourself killed.”

\---

Abelas followed him back out to gather up his things, his Hart, his father’s staff. It wasn’t until after all of those things had been taken care of, when Falon, Abelas, Hauwen, and Buerre had all rode back out to the graves of Clan Lavellan that Falon finally dismounted and walked some ways to a wide tree, where he broke down and began to cry.

Wail, more like. It was midday, and the sound drove birds from their perches in the trees and caused Hauwen to stir and Buerre to startle. Abelas hadn’t expected this reaction, and he stood by until Falon’s cries quieted some.

He didn’t know what there was to say. He approached quietly, and asked, “Do you regret what you did?”

Falon sniffed, hard. “That’s a really stupid question.”

Abelas nodded.

“Ir abelas.”

“Do _you_?” Falon asked, turning to Abelas.

For a moment Abelas wondered if Falon knew what he was here to do, but he had no idea how. Perhaps the voices from the virabellasan. Perhaps his reunion with the spy, Charter, had roused suspicion. But Falon had no way of knowing, and his tone was less accusatory, and more curious.

“There are always regrets,” Abelas said quietly. “I did my duty. All of us did. And one by one I watched our numbers dwindle. I remember each of them, how they fell, whether to shemlen or those who now call themselves elvhen, to thieves and plunderers and soldiers, to poison and blades and arrows and spells. It is difficult not to wonder if I could have stopped it.”

Falon nodded, his face still red and snot still dripping from his nose. Abelas offered him a handkerchief, and Falon wiped his face with it. “Did you at least get what _you_ wanted out of this trip?”

Abelas nodded. “Or at least what was needed.”

“That’s good. Do you think you can find your own way back? I just want a bit of time by myself right now.”

Part of Abelas wanted to refuse. It was foolish for Falon to stay out in the woods by himself. But he supposed he wasn’t alone. If not Hauwen, he had Charter tailing him. If not Charter, who knows who else. But he knew Falon had nothing to fear from simple wildlife, and offered a nod.

Abelas knew from the beginning that he would have to leave, eventually.

“You can even meet me back at Skyhold, if you want. Let Charter get you passage…”

Abelas smiled faintly. It wasn’t what he came to do. He gave Falon’s shoulder a light squeeze, which turned into a loose embrace. And Falon let him, because he realized what it meant. He said as much into Abelas’s shoulder – “You’re leaving, aren’t you.”

“I am,” Abelas admitted. “There is yet more to be done for me, and for you. This is where our paths must split.”

Falon shook his head – “There’s a place for you in Skyhold, if you want it. Now, a month from now, a year from now, whenever you like.”

He turned and mounted the horse Falon had bought him.

He could not help but feel knots in his chest when he tried to tell Falon that this would be the last time they crossed paths for a long time, and he dared not tell him of his true intentions. He offered one final, “Ir abelas, lethallin,” and rode off, but not before Falon called,

“And may the Dread Wolf never hear your steps, lethallin.”

Abelas could not help but think that this was quite impossible.

\---

Falon spent a few days in what remained of his clan’s camp, tending the trees and making sure to clear all of the arrows and blades before he would even dare leave. The Aravels he cleared of debris, and propped up if they seemed to have any use remaining. He couldn’t bring his clan back, but he could leave the land clear for those who would follow. At least he had Deshanna’s tome, his father’s staff, and, at long last, he would have his Keeper’s ring, sent to meet him in Skyhold.

He wouldn’t wear it – it wasn’t for someone like him to wear. But he could put it on a chain and carry it until he met someone meant for those duties. He had his own clan to keep, but in their absence, he decided it only fitting that he take up the mantle. After all, there was hardly anyone left to keep from Fen’Harel, so he was certain he could suffice in the interim.

He made sure to send a letter to Melwyn, a short, curt script thanking her for the dinner and reminding her to write, or visit, if it suited her, and to make sure to keep an eye out for the friends of Red Jenny in case the Duke got any ideas about rescinding his concessions to the Alienage folk. His friends of friends would be sure to let him know.

And then he simply got on a boat, Charter in tow, and rode back.

He returned to Skyhold walking beside his Hart, to the waiting arms of Bull, to Sera’s knuckles grinding into his scalp, to Cassandra’s look of stern disapproval melting in relief as she saw him safe, to Vivienne shaking her head and declaring he needed a change of clothes and a _hot_ bath, to Dorian dramatically bemoaning the lack of letters from their dear Inquisitor while Varric warned him he’d better prepare to share his stories over dinner, because he wasn’t letting him off so easily.

Clan Lavellan would never be as it was. But for the first time in a long while, Falon knew he had a home to return to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that's the end, friends. Hope you enjoyed the ride and that my characters and interpretations of the setting gave you some joy, because it gave me a lot of joy to write this and create these characters. Figured after all the angst I owed it to my stabby baby to give him some semblance of closure, even if it isn't what he wanted.
> 
> Essentially a looooong word doc I've been nursing in my spare time that I finally decided to clean up and share, hence how I was able to get out all these chapters so quickly. 
> 
> Might add an epilogue later to expound upon what Abelas proceeds to do, but I'm sure y'all can figure it out.


	10. Distance (Epilogue)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone watches Falon from afar.

One thing that Solas had always known would be to his advantage was how very predictable the young Inquisitor was. He was easily provoked, and always had been. So Solas made sure to account for the eventuality that he would retaliate against the Duke of Wycome.

He wouldn’t want to leave his clan’s justice to his advisors and soldiers – he would want to see to it himself.

So Solas instructed an agent to watch for him.

But he knew as well that Falon understood how to execute a feint, and that he rarely chose the most direct route. He wouldn’t want to leave an obvious trail. He would ride off in the night, but he wouldn’t take a ship. Not at first, at least.

So he moved his own pieces, and set his agent to watch for Falon’s movements through Orlais.

               

He first received notice of his agent’s success in the Fade, a pull towards a certain location. There he met Abelas, who greeted him with his arms crossed, with a nod.

“He is safe,” Abelas confirmed. “Should I stop him?”

“No. Let him do what he’s set out to do.”

Abelas’s lips quirked and his head tilted to the left. “Is he capable of it?”

“You should not underestimate him,” Solas replied. “He is willful, and resourceful. As you well know.”

Abelas nodded. He had, after all, seen first hand the way that Falon fought. What he lacked in raw strength he supplied in grit, in flexibility, in feints and tricks and subterfuge. Solas had once warned him not to treat every battle as a fight to the death, and Falon had snorted derisively and replied, “Every fight I’ve ever been in _was_. You must have better luck than me.”

Abelas nodded respectfully. “As you say. Do you have further instructions?”

“Not presently. Contact me if you feel it necessary.”

“Of course.”

 

And so Abelas offered more information, keeping his exchanges brief and concise. Solas had warned Abelas to mind what he said to the boy – he latched on to small details, so information given need be chosen carefully.

Abelas said, after some days journeying with him, “Falon has been shared more than he has requested.”

That seemed rather odd. Though he often did not _follow_ given wisdom, he asked many questions. He liked stories, and poetry, and lyrics and songs. Even the ones that did not suit him. He complained that he rather hated that _The Silver Knight_ was “propaganda” and was utterly _delighted_ to find a version of the tale outlawed by the chantry that told the story of the blade, Evanura’s wielder, instead.

“Is that so?”

“Yes,” Abelas replied. He allowed a faint smile to cross his face as he said, “He told me that you dislike him.”

Solas chuckled faintly. “I dislike his pertinacity, and his temper.”

Abelas tilted his head. “There was more to it, was there not?”

“It is rare that there is not,” Solas admitted. He found Falon volatile, and simple. But there were times when his tenacity was admirable. It served him well when his life was on the line, but poorly in matters of court and respectability. And he _was_ clever, if short-sighted. “He is as this world makes him. His goals are simple, and short, and he pursues them single-mindedly. If you were to attempt to stop him, for example, I do not doubt that he would turn on you.”

Abelas nodded. “I’ve no intention of doing so.”

“I know.”

               

“How fares the anchor?”

Abelas had to think on this. “He refers to it very rarely. It does not seem to pain him.”

“Take care with that – he has a habit of hiding his pain. He will not share it openly.”

“Even from you?”

Solas nodded. “Even from those he counts among his closest friends. He did not share the death of his clan, nor his nightmares, with them. Not intentionally.”

“He suffers nightmares?” Abelas asked, his voice clearly concerned.

He was becoming attached, Solas observed. “Yes. Frequently.”

“I did not notice—”

“He severs himself from the Fade,” Solas explained. “He _is_ a talented alchemist. I would be surprised if he did not bring enough of his medicine to last him for the trip.”

“What sort of nightmares?”

“I do not know, specifically,” Solas said. “But they were near nightly, until he learned the recipe.”

Abelas nodded very slowly. “I see.”

               

Solas should not have been surprised that Falon’s first action, before taking his vengeance on the Duke of Wycome, was to return to the place where his clan had camped, before they were slain. But Abelas had not been told much about the mission proper, and Solas did not tell him in case he revealed himself by being too knowledgeable.

Falon had little enough context that it was quite possible that even this would not reveal Abelas, but, then, Falon had always oriented himself to little slips of the tongue and prodded at them.

“Abelas,” Solas asked, “What is your impression of the Inquisitor?”

Abelas cocked his head. “Why?”

“Curiosity.”

“That is a difficult question,” Abelas said. Solas nodded. “He carries a great deal of pain, and anger, and sadness. He is stubborn, and prideful, and belligerent. And he cares, deeply, whether for his beast or his clan or his friends, and this leaves him vulnerable.”

It was a perspective that Solas realized he should have considered – that Falon cared little for his own wellbeing but had thrown himself into danger for the slightest chance of saving strangers and allies alike. He would get himself killed one day, that much was certain.

“He protects that which he cares for—” his Hart, his clan, his friends “—and he is precise—” a necessity for an alchemist “—and he carries much within him.”

The last part, Solas countered with a cocked head.

“He allowed me to visit his dreams,” Abelas admitted. “And they are exhausting.”

It almost pained Solas to hear this. He had thought, when he provided Falon his requested recipe, that the nightmares would pass with time, that once they defeated Nightmare he would recover himself and be more whole, and this would restore his dreams to a more typical state. But instead, his nightmares grew more painful when he had them, he slept less, he relied too heavily on the potion and Solas realized he had taken it every night for months, that he was robbing himself of so much more than simple dreams.

“How so?”

“There are many that disturb him, many more that should not but are poisoned. I do not know what can be done.”

“Likely there is nothing,” Solas said. “They are intrinsically tied to his spirit. They cannot simply be removed.”

“His name is Friend,” Abelas replied. “Not Suffering.”

“Dalish elves do not name their children for the spirits they possess. Only the ones they wish them to possess.”

“Even so,” Abelas replied. “He carries much.”

Solas nodded. “I know, my friend. But his is not a pain that can be healed.”

 

“He cooks well,” Abelas said on another occasion, almost entirely unprompted.

Solas had to pause. He knew that Falon cooked for himself when he had time. If there was a campfire, a skillet or a wok, or a big stock pot, and if he had time to fish or forage, he spent his evenings busying his hands by making a meal. His hands were seldom idle.

It was rarely necessary, but at least a few of the Inquisition appreciated the gesture. Vivienne politely refused most dishes, and was more prone to scolding him for doing the work of a servant than she was to appraising his skill. Sera would complain even as she ate that she didn’t recognize the food.

Varric and Bull would eat anything.

Cole did not eat anything.

Cassandra and Dorian enjoyed Falon’s cooking when he shared it with them. Wild caught fish from the rivers or a bird shot through the eye and roasted, a stew of wild squash and herbs, or mushrooms stuffed with nuts and the cheese from their ration packs and roasted beside the fire. Solas had eaten it as well.

He would not prefer it to the finer foods he’d had, but it more than sufficed for a campside meal.

Less well-received were those of Falon’s dishes that included insects. He did not think it strange when he first joined, and early on he had treated Cassandra, and Varric, and Solas to a meal of a squash stuffed with crumbled goat cheese and something with sort of a popping texture, which, upon closer inspection, was a large, writhing wood larva.

Bull was the only one who continued to eat Falon’s insect-based cooking. It tastes just fine, he said, so who cares?

“He has kept you fed then,” Solas said with a light chuckle. He remembered that Falon had always eaten sparingly on the road. He drank tea or ginger steeped in water more than he ate. Nerves were most likely the culprit. “How is he?”

Abelas raised a brow. He did not have to say, _I thought your concern was for his mission._

But instead he said, “He survives.”

“Yes,” Solas said with a nod. “He makes a habit of that.”

“I made him rest,” Abelas said. “This place exhausts him.”

“I do not doubt it,” Solas said.

“He is counting the bodies. Making a list of names. He thinks the First may live.”

Solas shook his head. “He’d have contacted his son, were it true.”

“Something stirs,” Abelas said. “I will contact you later.”

 

“Abelas.”

“The task is finished,” Abelas said. “His clan is put to rest.”

“Ah.”

“He found his father’s body, and his staff. He died away from the others. Luring the attackers to their deaths, it seemed. Perhaps blocking a path so others may escape. Falon did not find all of the bodies. His father may have succeeded, in some light.”

That did not undo the deaths Falon had already endured, the people who would not return to him, the death of his brother which left him so slow to trust, so angry.

“He completed the burial in Dalish custom,” Abelas said flatly.

“As I would expect.”

“He said something of interest. He said, we do what we can with what we have,” Abelas replied.

Modern poverty supplemented by resourcefulness and scrounging.

               

More surprising than the revelation that Falon could cook was the revelation that a former member of his clan, now scarred and disfigured, now resided in the Alienage, where he sold wooden carvings and insisted they would ward away evil spirits. A superstition that was unpopular in a largely Andrastian alienage.

“He is a distraction,” Abelas said. “How long should I allow this?”

“As long as is necessary,” Solas replied.

Abelas nodded. “What would you have me do when he nears his goal?”

Solas said, “Let him have his vengeance.”

This surprised Abelas – his expression shifted _ever_ so slightly to reveal his confusion. He had thought his purpose was to keep the boy safe, to stop him from acting too rashly, to keep him alive until he returned to his companions.

There were other reasons for allowing the Duke to die – he was under the influence of the Venatori, and would need to be eliminated at some point. Allowing the Inquisitor to do it simply absolved Solas of another action.

“Should he falter?” Abelas asked.

“His life should take precedence,” Solas confirmed. “If it seems he will fail, remove him.”

It was not the most urgent of matters – but it would be done either way. The Duke would die, the Venatori would be extracted.

“As you say. I will protect him.”

 

The next Abelas spoke to Solas, he had much to share. Firstly, Falon had woken sometime in the night and wandered off. In that short time he claimed to have made a new friend, a girl his age or a year or two older who, Abelas noted with a smirk, “attempted to court him without him once noticing.”

They had a good laugh at their expense – it was good to see Falon acting his age.

“The craftsman, Juna, said something apt,” Abelas said. “Once they have their vallas’lin, they know everything.”

Solas barked out a sharp laugh in reply.

But things had not gone according to plan. Falon had revealed himself as the Inquisitor, rather than sneaking into the keep in the night as Solas expected, and he had met with the Duke and demanded recompense not for his clan but for the others in the alienage.

Solas tried very hard to read Abelas, to see if he was perhaps lying. But this was no lie.

“He left without violence,” Abelas confirmed.

“He did…”

Abelas nodded. “He claimed concern for those in the alienage. He feared retaliation would find them, if he acted in violence. Instead he demanded the lands his clan walked be given to any survivors, and funds for those in the alienage who lost their kin to plague, and demanded they receive representation among the nobility.”

Solas nodded. Respectable requests – enforceable ones even. The kind that he might have been able to eke out of Josephine with some work, but hadn’t.

“He was distressed.”

“Why?”

“He implied that it was not what he wanted,” Abelas recalled. “He was exhausted, after. He claimed he wanted to return to Skyhold alone. I allowed him – he was being tailed by an Inquisition agent…an elf, red hair—”

“Charter.”

“Yes.”

“She is capable enough. He will be safe enough until his return.”

“He invited me to Skyhold,” Abelas noted. “Would this be of benefit to you?”

Ah. He wanted to.

“Perhaps, in time,” Solas said. “But as the Duke still lives, there is more to be done in Wycome. We will see to that first.”

“Of course.”

 

When Falon crossed the Waking Sea anew, and arrived at Skyhold, Solas had his agents there fill him in. Falon returned, and was, if not pleased with his decision, adamant that it be enforced. Lelianna rather approved of it, and set several of her own agents, one of which was amenable to Solas, to mind that it be taken care of.

The craftsman followed Falon to Skyhold shortly after, where he took Blackwall’s place in the stables, carving toys and trinkets that soldiers and servants rather enjoyed collecting. He was not a man of power, or influence, but an apparently welcome fixture. And, as one agent reported while fidgeting with a little halla charm tied around her neck in leather chord, the craftsman’s work as it turned out, Juna was one of the very few people who could handle the Inquisitor’s mount without fear of being bitten or kicked.

“Finally,” she said. “That thing scares the living daylights out of me. I don’t know how he can stand it.”

It was not much longer before Falon returned to Wycome, briefly, to inspect the lands allocated to his clan members. It seemed that no one from his own clan had come – the Dalish were not trusting of humans, particularly not humans who had already proven capable of razing an entire camp. But he reportedly came with Sera, who he introduced to his new friend, and a new Red Jenny was born.

Stranger still, Falon seemed determined to dream again, and Solas came across him in the Fade.

He did not recognize Solas – Solas took the form of a black wolf, and Falon’s dream was not tainted with loss or fear as Abelas had noted but calm and dreary and mundane. He foraged, he planted seeds in the ground, and he walked.

He kept an ear towards Solas the whole way, warning occasionally, “I’m not easy prey, friend. Hunt elsewhere.”

An odd way to refer to what he perceived as an animal, as though it might apologize and skulk off. But that was exactly what Solas did. He lowered his head in an approximation of a nod, and padded off, leaving Falon to rest.               

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When you're counting on someone to be incapable of controlling their anger but then they learn and grow as a person.


End file.
